site.btaMedia Review: August 21

HIGHLIGHS

Trud leads with a story saying in the headline that "vote manipulation is enshrined in the Election Code". The story quotes experts as saying that the legislation must be revised and that the Central Election Commission must be made "owner" of the processes involved in machine voting. The story says: "Two months ahead of the local elections, election experts, lawyers and IT specialists and OSCE observers say that the elections in Bulgaria are not transparent because of inadequate legislation and the machine voting is essentially dependent on a foreign company." The story quotes OSCE recommendations saying that Bulgaria seems unable to decide whether or not it wants to use new technologies for voting. The Central Election Commission, for its part, calls for profound changes in the Election Code. The paper has the opinion of constitutional law professor Natalia Kisselova, former Central Election Commission chairpersons Alexander Andreev and Ililina Alexieva and IT expert Dobroslav Dimitrov.

Trud also carries a comment by mathematics professor and elections experts Mihail Konstantinov where he says he would never tire to repeat that machine voting does not exist anywhere else in Europe. The professor is an outspoken opponent of the machine voting, which Bulgaria has used on and off in elections for the past few years.

In the morning show of the Bulgarian National Television, Central Election Commission Spokesperson Rossitsa Mateva said that they have not yet announced a public procurement procedure for the voting machine interface for the local elections on October 29. The problem is that when the machines and the software were purchased, the plan was not to use them for local elections, Mateva explained.

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The front-page story in the Socialists' Duma paper is about the breaking of a commemorative plate on the controversial Monument to the Soviet Army in central Sofia and the Socialists' plans to restore it. All this comes on the backdrop of the local authorities making plans to dismantle the monument and move it to a museum of socialist art. A front-page commentary on the August 18 attack on the monument makes a parallel with the 1938 Kristallnacht in Germany and Austria. 

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Mediapool.bg leads with a story Monday morning about the government planning to raise the pay for long-term secondment of diplomats in a bid to appease them following their protests last year over low pay. Foreign Minister Mariya Gabriel offers an average increase of 18% or EUR 18.59 of the daily rate in a draft ordinance which has already been published for public consultation.

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The cover story in Telegraph says that it costs more to have a first-grader in the family than an eighth-grader. That conclusion is based on the costs of school stationary and school books. 

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In its morning show, bTV had an interview with the lawyer of Debora of Stara Zagora, a high-profile victim of domestic violence whose shocking case triggered a wide-spread outrage and prompted changes in the Criminal Code towards more rigorous punishments for domestic violence. He said that the women's physical condition is improving but she will take much longer to heal mentally. He expects the prosecutors to revise the charges against the offender after forensic medics revised their assessment of the level of injury he caused on the woman from trivial to medium. That would also change dramatically the punishment upon conviction.

DRIVING UNDER THE INFLUENCE

The new measures against driving under the influence get front-page prominent in 24 Chasa chassa with stories in several other media outlers. 24 Chasa leads with an acrticle saying that in the 12 days since the latest changes in the Criminal Code took effect, the authorities have seized the vehicles of 236 drunken or drugged drivers, including the daughter of former Bulgarian Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha who was caught driving under the influence during the weekend. The authorities seize the vehicle of any driver they catch with over 1.2 per mille of alcohol in the blood.

Most papers write about Saxe-Coburg-Gotha's daughter, Kalina. 

bTV and Nova have reports on her drunken-driving incident.  

Narcotics expert Dr Julian Karadjov says  in 24 Chasa that a pill for headache with codeine may read as morphine in a blood test and Nurofen in a field test may read as cannabis. The professor also says that the software in the devices for analysis that police use often gives false results. He argues that the decisions on the matter should be made by specialists and that "police and politicians should leave the conversation because all they seek is publicity stunts". 

In an interview that starts on the front page of Telegraph, the former head of the Sofia Traffic Police, Tencho Tenev, voices optimism that the confiscation of vehicles, while far from being the perfect measures, will help remove alcohol and drugs from the roads.

The Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) had an interview Monday morning with Diana Russinova of the European Centre for Transport Policies who welcomes the measures, including the confiscation of a vehicle for driving under the influence, but says they were adopted under pressure from the street and will likely be voted down soon under the same pressure. Commenting the incident involving the daughter of Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, Kalina, who was caught driving after drinking in the mountain resort of Borovets, Russinova says that it is inadmissible to drink and drive, no matter who did it, and that it is even worse when the offender is a public figure. She is optimistic that the stricter measures will have a strong deterring effect and does not agree that they will increase corruption.

POLITICS

Trud has a commentary by Borislav Tsekov of the New Europe Centre, titled "The Constitutional Deviations of the President". The author says that the President has clearly trespassed out of the territory designated for him by the Constitution. "We have seen massive presidential interference in appointments in the state administration, the security services and the state-owned economic sectors," he adds.

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In Trud, politician Yordan Velichkov argues against moving the National Day of Bulgaria to May 24 (the Day of the Bulgarian Alphabet, Education and Culture and of Slav Letters) from March 3 (the observance of the signing of the Treaty of San Stefano in the Russo-Turkish War in 1878). The story is titled "We Need to Change Our Politicians: not Our National Day". The author is the leader of the Zashtita Union of Patriotic Forces, a former MP of the nationalist Ataka party, then an independent deputy.

ECONOMY

24 Chasa analyses Bulgarians' costs now and in the recent months, and looks into some spending patterns ("Bulgarians Spend for Entertainment Now Before All Their Money Goes for Utility Bills in Winter"). The author uses official statistics showing that while inflation was driven by the price of fuel and other energy sources last summer and by foods last winter, now it is pushed up by Bulgarians' spending for entertainment, sport, culture and leisure, which have gone up by 7.5% in July alone. By comparison, foods have appreciated only by 0.1%. Statistics on Sumptionion confirms that: consumption goes down for some staple foods such as bread, meat and yogurt, and goes up for leisure, clothes and foods.

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Telegraph and Dnevnik.bg reproduces an analysis by Peter Ganev of the Institute for Market Economics where he says that inflation is taking Bulgaria away from the eurozone. The Dnevnik headline is "Inflation Remains High and the Eurozone Criterion Hard to Achieve". This country hopes to join the eurozone at the beginning of 2025. The analysts says that inflation in July was 8.5% according to national statistics and 7.8% according to the harmonized index. The next convergence report for Bulgaria is due in June 2024 and it will make it clear whether this country meets the standards. 

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A story in the Agro supplement of Telegraph says that this year's grapes harvest (wine varieties) is expected to be smaller but of finer quality than last year's.  Major wine-making regions including Sandanski in the south-west, Montana and Vratsa in the north-west, and Haskovo in the south, are seeing a decline in grapes production due to adverse whether and diseases. By contrast, a very strong year is seen in Razgrad in the north-east, Ruse on the Danube, Central Bulgaria and Burgas region on the Black Sea.

A story in Trud by financier Dimitar Chobanov explains how financial crises work. The headline says that "financial crisis are not frequent but occur regularly". According to the author, Europe seems more vulnerable to financial crises than the US. 

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Duma reports that the number of people coming to Bulgaria on adventure tourism has doubled. The story compares the figures for all markets this year and last year. It quotes Lyubomir Popyordanov, the chair of the Mountains and People Association, who spoke on the Bulgarian National Television.  He says that the preferred vacation option for such people are mountain trekking, climbing, horseback riding, cycling, adventure camps for children and holidays in guest houses. Tourists from France, Germany, Spain and English-speaking countries appreciate the natural beauty and diversity on a relatively small territory. 

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Duma says that savings deposits of over 1 million leva have increased by 30% in the past 12 months - both as a number as in volume - after banks scrapped the charges for taking deposits. Banks, however, continue to pay depositors zero interest for their deposits.

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24 Chasa has a story about five problems "in the (in)just transition plans". All five include: "lack of precise forecast about the replacement of coal"; "lack of clarity what will replace coal"; "insecure alternatives"; "lack of consumption forecast" and "lack of perspective for the people".  Two bullets under the headline say that Bugaria may experience power shortage seven years from now and that 27,000 people in poor regions will be out of job and without a clear alternative for employment.  

HOME AFFAIRS

24 Chasa carries an interview with former Interior Minister Ivan Demerdzhiev who says that the government will use the August 16 killing of businessman Alexey Petrov as an opportunity to carry out a purge in the law-enforcing services. He reiterates that Petrov obviously had a role in putting together the current government and close relations with the father of Continue the Change co-leader Kiril Petkov and GERB leader Boyko Borissov. The former Interior Minister says that he had warned that unprincipled dismissals [of heads of the Regional Directorates of the Interior] and appointments in the Interior Ministry would cause problems and now such problems are seen every day; that he doubts that this Parliament has the capacity it needs to revise the Constitution; that if Bulgaria is denied entry in the Schengen area again, it will be its own fault this time.

The Bulgarian National Radio, too, has an interview with Demerdzhiev, and most of it is about the killing of Alexey Petrov and about the removal of regional directors of the interior. He said that Petrov was "a scriptwriter and an actor, and his killing should be investigated very carefully". He also argued that that killing was "a national security question". "There are people whom I fear might experience the same as Petrov. I can think of several such people who are in a similar satiation, they are fewer than the finger on one hand," Demerdzhiev said. As for the shakeup in the high echelons of the Interior Ministry, he says that it is "normal" to make personnel changes but when they are clearly motivated. 

Trud reports the breaking up of a drug lab of unprecedented scale run by three citizens of the Netherlands. The story says that rumour had it that the Dutch were investing in a flooring factory and hoped it would open jobs. The facility was making synthetic drugs for the domestic and international market. The group was on the law enforcers' radar for a year. 

SOCIETY

Dnevnik.bg writes that  culture is now for the large cities only and that is a problem. "Ivan lives in Deleina - a village 25 km away from Vidin and very close to the border with Serbia. He loves art, but if he wants to go to the cinema or theatre, he has to go to the regional capital. There is a bus on the Deleina-Vidin line twice a week, and the buses only run until noon and in the afternoon. So Ivan has to either arrange his own transport or stay overnight in Vidin. And that makes the whole project too costly for a resident of the European Union's poorest region. The problem Ivan and the people of Dileina have is shared by most villages and smaller towns in the country: for them, access to cultural events is limited, both because of the location and because of their scarce financial resources. Representatives of the cultural sector say this is a serious problem that the state has neglected for years. They even consider the lack of measures as a violation of civil rights, since according to Article 54 of the Constitution 'everyone has the right to enjoy national and common human cultural values, as well as to develop their culture in accordance with their ethnicity, which is recognized and guaranteed by law'. Lack of access to cultural events has other consequences, including segregation. And while NGOs seek partial solutions, the authorities remain silent on whether and how they plan to tackle the problem," the story says.

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Duma has a full-page story about Open Society and its founder George Soros. The story is entitled "How Open Society Closes Our Eyes" and the subheading says that "for long years, the organization has been supporting NGOs working to push through foreign interests wherever they can".

THE WORLD

All media outlets on Monday report that Russia's Luna-25 spacecraft has crashed into the moon. An Indian spacecraft is now expected to land on the moon.

Trud has a full-page story on Donald Trump and upcoming "political and judicial events" on his calendar.  The paper says that despite the felony charges against him, he remains the Republicans' favourite for the presidential race.

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Duma reports that the power holders and opposition in Skopje traded accusations of torpedoing the EU integration of the country.

SPORT 

Trud has a central front-page photo showing Bulgarian Ambassador in Baku Vladimir Bakardjiev making the first move in the second game of the World Cup chess finals in which Bulgarian chess sensation Nurgyul Salimova played the world's second Aleksandra Goryachkina of Russia. The two drew the first match on August 19 and the second on August 20. 

All media outlets on Monday write about Salimova, who will be playing her third - and last - World Cup final match with Goryachkina on Monday.