site.btaUPDATED Another Day of Voting Fails to Produce Chairperson of Sofia Municipal Council

The Sofia Municipal Council will be meeting again on February 8 after the councilors Thursday failed to elect their chairperson once again. Not having a chairperson has practically blocked the work of the municipal council that was elected at the October 29, 2023 local elections.

Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria and Save Sofia are the largest group in the Municipal Council but fall short of the 31 votes needed to elect a chairperson. They have nominated for the position Save Sofia leader Boris Bonev. GERB-UDF, which controlled Sofia between 2005 and 2023 but is now the second largest party in the municipal council, refuses to back him or nominate their own candidate. The other groups' candidates have negligible support.

There was some hope for Thursday when Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria put forward a new candidate, other than Boris Bonev: Tsvetomir Petrov, but he only got 23 votes of the 31 that are needed. Diana Tonova of BSP for Bulgaria, got nine votes, and Plamen Danailov of There Is Such a People four votes. After the first voted failed, and another one after it, the muncipal councilors decided to break for talks before they try a third vote. After the talks, it was clear that they are far from concensus. 

Karlos Kontrera of VMRO put forward his own nomination and said "otherwise we will go round in circle until we convince ourselves that we are total idiots". The nomination, however, was not put to the vote.

On January 24, twelve bilateral chambers of industry and commerce sent a message to Sofia Mayor Vassil Terziev and the Municipal Council, urging the municipal councilors to choose constructive dialogue and elect their chairperson the soonest possible "to ensure the normal functioning of the Municipal Council". That will allow the Council to adopt the municipal budget and go about its normal work. "We believe that success and sustainability are only possible through cooperation and joint action," the organizations said in the open letter which was also received at BTA.

The joint chambers point out that it is strategically important for the capital city to ensure effective work at all levels for the benefit of society and its prosperity through constructive solutions and striving to create favourable conditions related to a predictable environment and sustainability. Solving this important issue is beneficial for the citizens of Sofia, for business and for society as a whole, the letter says.

The letter was signed by the leaders of the German-Bulgarian Chamber of Industry and Commerce; the American Chamber of Commerce in Bulgaria; the Belgium-Bulgaria-Luxembourg Business Club; the British-Bulgarian Business Association; the Bulgarian-Spanish Chamber of Commerce; the Bulgarian-Romanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry; the Bulgarian-Swiss Chamber of Commerce; Confindustria Bulgaria; the Hungarian-Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce; the French-Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry; the Dutch-Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce; and the Swedish-Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce.

Sofia Municipality's budget for 2024 is a record - BGN 2.576 billion, Sofia Mayor Vassil Terziev said at a briefing later on Thursday. If there is no Sofia City Council, the record budget will have to wait a bit and we will have to work with the 2023 one, which was BGN 2.3 billion, Terziev added.

A public discussion of the budget is being held on Thursday evening at St. Kliment Ohridski University.

Construction of kindergartens, improvement of infrastructure, construction of multi-storey car parks, as well as funds for designing them are planned, Deputy Mayor for Finance Ivan Vassilev said. More funds are earmarked for cleanliness and for landscaping and digital transformation to make Sofia Municipality services accessible to citizens and businesses.