site.btaMedia Review: January 12

The topic of the future of the ruling majority (the so-called assemblage) dominates Friday’s news media.

POLITICS

Trud’s front-page article reads that politicians remained silent when asked about a second rotation in the Government after the first one in March 2024, but representatives of the ruling majority Monday began talking about a continuation of the joint governance after the 18 months agreed upon at the start of the Cabinet’s term in office last year. On the first day of Parliament’s new session, members of the ruling coalition, which calls itself an assemblage, made it clear that they wish to continue ruling the country after the nine months of GERB’s Mariya Gabriel as prime minister. However, it remains unclear how that will happen: will Gabriel remain a prime minister or will CC-DB’s Nikolay Denkov return to that post in nine months? Approached for comment, political expert Yurii Aslanov told the daily that if the assemblage survives the European Parliament elections, it is realistic to expect the Government will remain in power until the very end of its term in office and might even try to win a second term, because that is in the interest of all participants and there is no alternative threatening such a possibility. The power holders are very unpopular among the people, but there is no organized political force to express that dissatisfaction, therefore the voters’ apathy will probably continue, the expert believes.

24 Chasa has an interview with political analyst Boris Stanimirov, who argues that the ruling coalition managed to fulfill its main task: power returning to Parliament and an end to the political crisis. There are both preconditions and logic for it remaining in power until the end of its term in office, provided there is no visible change in public attitudes, the challenges facing the country remain unchanged, and the current parliamentary majority is the only one capable of facing them. The rotation of the prime minister has proven itself a working formula when there is no trust between the parties, so it can be applied in the Sofia Municipal Council, Stanimirov believes. 

Mediapool.bg writes that the election of two constitutional judges on Parliament’s quota is the first test for the situation in the ruling majority, which is about to undertake the most responsible task yet: the change of the leadership and members in 19 regulatory bodies and state structures. The large-scale changes at the State’s top will either strengthen or break the assemblage. In early December, the leaders of GERB and Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) said that they want to start fresh, so they will draft a mechanism for appointments at the regulatory bodies. That happened in their sixth month in power, which caused the heads of the National Health Insurance Fund to resign a day after their election. Sources of Mediapool in the assemblage confirmed that such a mechanism has not been drafted yet. 

On Bulgarian National Radio, sociologist Marchela Abrasheva commented that the ruling majority remains together, because the conditions that maintain it remain (Ukraine, the eurozone, and Schengen) and there is no alternative. The rotation in the Government requires a parliamentary procedure that is not a formality, she noted. The change of the prime minister and some ministers will probably happen after negotiations and mutual compromises between GERB-UDF, CC-DB, and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, the likes of which occurred in the last month or two. These parties appear to have learned how to interact; what benefits that brings to society in the long run remains to be seen, Abrasheva noted. If something breaks the assemblage, it would rather be a serious incident regarding interests or an intention, she added. 

On Bulgarian National Television’s morning show, MP of CC-DB Yavor Bozhankov commented that there should be agreement between his coalition and GERB-UDF on any changes in ministers when the rotation of the prime minister happens in March. “Every single minister, if replaced, will be the result of a dialogue between the two coalitions. A minister cannot possibly be replaced because one part of the majority or the other wanted it. There should be agreement on every specific minister,” Bozhankov said. 

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Trud has an interview with Iva Miteva, former National Assembly chair of There Is Such a People, about the constitutional amendments passed in late December 2023. The revisions were claimed to be made in people’s name because there is a feeling of huge injustice in society. True, people are dissatisfied with the Judiciary’s work: with the lack of efficiency and speed in legal proceedings and with the lack of justice. However, the changes in the Constitution do not solve these issues, she argues. According to her, the judicial reform should be done not with declarations but with hard and in-depth work together with the Judiciary’s bodies. Changing the Constitution requires a broad public and political consensus, she notes. According to her, a literacy requirement for MPs should have been added in the Constitution. As unclearly and ambiguously as they are written, many of the amendments should first be interpreted by the Constitutional Court to be applied.  

On Bulgarian National Television’s morning show, lawyer Emil Georgiev from the Justice for All initative and Borislav Tsekov, an Assoc Prof in constitutional law, commented on the constitutional changes and the President referring them to the Constitutional Court. According to Georgiev, the arguments put forward during the public discussions on the draft revisions were only partially taken into consideration. During the changes to the draft between first and second reading, it became clear that some arguments were taken into view but others were not. Georgiev expects the Constitutional Court to come out with a serious and in-depth decision, and the constitutional judges to show bravery. According to Tsekov, the arguments and proposals made by experts and NGOs during the public discussions were barely taken into view. He expects the Constitutional Court to carefully interpret the revisions concerning caretaker governments and the division of the Supreme Judicial Council into three bodies, whether such changes can be made by a regular parliament. 

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Duma quotes Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) Deputy Chair Irena Anastasova as telling Nova News that the Bulgarian citizens were lied to about what the State signed to get Bulgaria in Schengen by air and water. “We believe that is humiliating for Bulgaria: we are not second-class country and people. The open-access documents show that the power holders have agreed to the quick return here of refugees from Syria and Afghanistan,” she noted. According to her, Bulgaria’s two-way trade with Schengen countries by air and water is just 3%, compared to 97% by land, meaning that the agreement reached with Austria is no achievement but an attempt by that country to solve the problem with its refugees by transferring them to Bulgaria ahead of the termination of the Dublin Regulation. On Monday, the BSP demanded a hearing of Foreign Minister Mariya Gabriel, but the parliamentary majority rejected the proposal. In Anastasova’s words, the ruling majority clearly fears what the Bulgarian citizens might hear.

On Bulgarian National Television’s morning show, Bulgarian MEP Tsvetelina Penkova (BSP/S&D Group) commented that Bulgaria has met all criteria for entry in Schengen, and what has been happening in the last 12 years is discriminatory. The country could have joined Schengen by air and water back in 2018. It is the land border that is key for Bulgaria; that is where there are economic interests to be protected. In her words, the partial success is just a morsel, which is politically irresponsible. It is important for Bulgaria to uphold its demands and be careful what it agrees to regarding Schengen. “We should know exactly what we want, what the problems and cases we encounter are, because by saying we do not want to do something or by accepting some conditions and then going back on them, we do not send the right messages,” Penkova argued.    

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Segabg.com reports that municipal councilors of There Is Such a People (TISP) in Plovdiv (South Central Bulgaria) have tabled a proposal for a local referendum on the future of the Alyosha monument in the city. The idea comes in reply to Democratic Bulgaria’s recent proposal that this monument to the Soviet Army be moved to Sofia’s Museum of Socialist Art by the year’s end. The proposed referendum aims for a negative reply to the relocation. It is very probable that a referendum gets held, because few of the municipal councilors support the monument’s removal; there is disagreement even in Continue the Change, which is a partner of Democratic Bulgaria. The Plovdiv Municipal Council’s legal committee has already requested that the administration calculate the cost of both ideas – a removal of the monument and a referendum – and whether it is technically possible to move the monument. The article recalls that the matter of Alyosha has been raised multiple times in the last 34 years; it became topical after the removal of the Monument to the Soviet Army in Sofia in December 2023.

The morning shows of both Nova TV and bTV approached representatives of several formations on the Plovdiv Municipal Council for a comment. It appears the formations are divided in three groups: for Alyosha’s removal (CC-DB), against the removal (Bulgarian Socialist Party), for a public debate on whether or not to remove the monument (GERB, Union for Plovdiv, TISP, and BraVo, Plovdiv). bTV recalled that there are eight formations on the Plovdiv Municipal Council, and GERB is the biggest one.

 ECONOMY

Capital Weekly’s main topic is the retrofitting of multi-family residential buildings. After nearly a decade of free retrofitting for the owners, the cost of renovating a residential building is no longer to be covered completely by a grant, the programme’s end being marked by scandals and suspected corruption. After spending over BGN 3 billion on the programme, the State now faces a problem: over 65,000 buildings require retrofitting but only some 2,000 of them have been renovated. The new programme covers 80% of the owners’ costs, but only a handful of applications have been submitted under it thus far, and the deadline is January 16. Also, the financial resources are under BGN 300 million, which will cover the retrofitting of some 200 buildings only, and every family in the building will have to provide their share of the co-funding, because no one would want to pay for their neighbour. This is a completely new situation that requires a different approach and a research into the options for providing funding, the article reads. A related article looks at those options. Another article tells an inside story of what went wrong with the first retrofitting programme and the problems with the applications’ preparation.

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In a story titled, “The National Revenue Agency vs the Church”, Capital Weekly writes about the second audit of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church underway since November 2023. The State’s first attempt to get a better idea at what the Church actually owns and what its monetary income is, ended in 2013. Though the Church’s subsidies grew to BGN 38.4 million in this year’s budget and it owns hundreds of properties, the Holy Synod reacted strongly to the audit, claiming the State has no right to check the Church’s accounts. In a seven-page letter to the National Revenue Agency, the Holy Synod describes the audit as anti-constitutional as well as a national security risk. Capital Weekly sent an inquiry to the Holy Synod about the audit but is yet to receive a reply. The weekly also turned to an expert in church law, Prof Dilyan Nikolchev, for an interpretation of the Holy Synod’s letter, which mixes history, religion, and law. According to him, the letter is not well sustained in terms of the law and church law, and it is deeply wrong in its interpretation.

HOME AFFAIRS

Telegraf writes on its front page about penalties for underage criminals. There are only seven underage criminals behind bars, the story goes. 

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24 Chasa’s front-page article is about this season’s flu, which can affect one’s health for an entire month and hits the respiratory system, the heart, and the brain.