site.btaCaretaker PM-Designate Fails in Cabinet Formation Bid as President Denies Approval over Interior Minister Nomination

President Rumen Radev Monday set a precedent in Bulgaria's contemporary history Monday morning as he refused to decree a new caretaker cabinet proposed by prime minister-designate Goritsa Grancharova-Kozhareva because of Kalin Stoyanov's nomination for caretaker interior minister. 

Grancharova - Kozhareva presented the structure and lineup of her caretaker cabinet to Radev. In the proposal, 15 of the 19 portfolios were to be held by members of Dimitar Glavchev's incumbent caretaker cabinet, including Stoyanov:

Prime Minister: Goritsa Grancharova-Kozhareva
Minister of Foreign Affairs: Ivan Kondov
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance: Lyudmila Petkova
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Innovation and Growth: Rosen Karadimov
Minister of Interior: Kalin Stoyanov
Minister of Defence: Atanas Zapryanov
Minister of Environment and Water: Viktor Atanasov
Minister of Energy: Vladimir Malinov
Minister of Regional Development and Public Works: Violeta Koritarova
Minister of Agriculture and Food: Georgi Tahov
Minister of Economy and Industry: Petko Nikolov
Minister of Labour and Social Policy: Ivan Ivanov
Minister of Justice: Mariya Pavlova
Minister of Health: Petko Stefanovski
Minister of Education and Science: Galin Tsokov
Minister of Tourism: Eftim Miloshev
Minister of Transport and Communications: Valeri Borisov
Minister of Electronic Governance: Valentin Mudrov
Minister of Culture: Nayden Todorov
Minister of Youth and Sports: Georgi Glushkov

Kozhareva said that the proposed cabinet will have two priorities: to organize and conduct fair elections, and to stick to Bulgaria's Euro-Atlantic orientation.

The President gave Grancharova-Kozhareva until 3 p.m. on Monday to propose a different interior minister. The PM-designate said that she made a well-informed decision and would not back down.

Radev said that, in this case, the new caretaker cabinet will not be sworn in by Parliament on Tuesday and the next early parliamentary elections will not be held on October 20 as initially planned.

The head of State urged Parliament to do what is necessary to broaden the pool of senior office holders from which he can select a caretaker prime minister. That pool was narrowed by the latest amendments to the Constitution, adopted in December 2023, to the Chair of the National Assembly, the Governor or a Deputy Governor of the Bulgarian National Bank (BNB), the President or a Vice President of the National Audit Office, and the Ombudsman or a Deputy Ombudsman.

The President said that out of the dozen or so potential nominees for PM, two positions are vacant, the term of the holders of two other has expired, and those in the central bank involve complications arising from EU legislation.

He was referring to Diana Kovatcheva, who vacated office as National Ombudsman after her election to the Åuropean Court of Human Rights. Deputy Ombudsman Elena Cherneva-Markova quit shortly before Dimitar Glavchev's caretaker Cabinet was formed according to the new rules. Glavchev himself was previously President of the Bulgarian National Audit Office (BNAO), and Grancharova-Kozhareva and Toshko Todorov are BNAO Vice-Presidents even though their term in office ran out in 2022 and Parliament has failed to elect their successors so far. BNB Governor Dimitar Radev and Deputy Governors Petar Chobanov and Radoslav Milenkov have proved ineligible because of incompatibility under EU regulations. The third Deputy Governor, Andrey Gurov, has been suspended from office pending a court judgment. National Assembly Chair Raya Nazaryan has declared that she does not wish to head a caretaker cabinet.

"Despite these deficiencies and complications, I will continue to work with these potential nominees who have declined to be designated so far, so that the deepening of the political crisis can be contained," Radev said.

Stoyanov: Why Sticking Point

Tensions have escalated over Stoyanov remaining interior minister. His replacement has been demanded by Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) and Vazrazhdane. On the other hand, Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) Floor Leader and co-chair Delyan Peevski has been openly campaigning for his continuance in office.

In a position endorsed by his parliamentary group, Bozhidar Bozhanov MP of CC-DB said in a Facebook post that it is crucial for Peevski to have Stoyanov as interior minister because if the MRF faction that opposes Peevski succeeds in ousting them and he is forced to run separately in the forthcoming elections, he does not stand any chance of entering Parliament.

Bozhanov pointed out that at the latest elections, at least 25,000 votes had switched from GERB to the MRF. "It is a public secret that the MRF relies on two types of votes: the Movement's traditional electorate and bought votes, with Peevski responsible for the latter," the MP alleged. "Vote buying counts on orderly arrangements that cannot function without the Interior Ministry. Because the Interior Ministry is aware of the vote brokers and where and how things happen," the CC-DB MP explained. "If they are tipped 'from above' to prevent the buying, they do it successfully: summoning people, writing cautions. If not, it's 'business as usual'." 

For his part, Stoyanov has claimed that he had come under a severe attack from CC-DB. He recalled that Continue the Change co-leader Kiril Petkov had personally invited him to join the Nikolay Denkov cabinet (in office June 2023 - April 2024). "Subsequently, he [Petkov] and his entourage, after finding out that I won't take orders by phone about particular appointments, realized that I'm not their man, and in the course of a year we have been witnessing daily attacks and demands for my resignation," Stoyanov commented.

He added that in recent days certain political leaders have been publicly seeking an interior minister who "would recover in some way the approximately 300,000 votes lost in the latest elections, but they can hardly find such an expert."

The reference was apparently to the CC-DB coalition. In the last two early parliamentary elections, they garnered 621,069 votes on April 2, 2023 and 307,849 votes on June 9, 2024. 

Ten Caretaker Cabinets Since 1991

Kozareva-Grancharova's caretaker cabinet would have been Bulgaria's eleventh since this form was institutionalized by the 1991 Constitution. So far, such interim governments have run the country between October 1994 and January 1995 (headed by Reneta Indzhova), February-May 1997 (Stefan Sofiyanski), March-May 2013 (Marin Raykov), August-November 2014 (Georgi Bliznashki), January-May 2017 (Ognyan Gerdzhikov), May-September 2021 (Stefan Yanev), September-December 2021 (Stefan Yanev), August 2022 - February 2023 (Galab Donev), February-June 2023 (Galab Donev), and April-August 2024 (Dimitar Glavchev). The first caretaker cabinet was appointed by President Zhelyu Zhelev, the second one by Petar Stoyanov, the third and fourth by Rosen Plevneliev, and the remaining seven by Rumen Radev.

That caretaker cabinet would have also been the second one to be formed by the rules that were set in place by the revision of the Constitution in 2023.