site.btaUPDATED CC Co-chair Petkov Calls for "Cordon Sanitaire" around Delyan Peevski's MRF-New Beginning

"We are witnessing a large-scale abuse. We actually have a party which, if we had working institutions, would not be in parliament," Continue the Change Co-chair Kiril Petkov said during a press conference here on Tuesday. 

Petkov was referring to the Movement for Rights and Freedoms - New Beginning coalition, chaired by Delyan Peevski, who, in Petkov's words, could not have achieved such a result in the elections given his low public approval rating, and could not have secured a place in parliament without vote buying.

Kiril Petkov called for a "cordon sanitaire" (sanitary cordon) around Peevski's party, namely for the other parliamentary groups in the 51st National Assembly to sign a declaration that they will not work with MRF-New Beginning in the future parliament in any form.

Bozhidar Bozhanov said that the election result of the coalition was decent and it has recuperated some 38,000 votes. He clarified that they do not have a name for a prime minister who is equidistant from all political parties and insisted that the logic of this proposal is avoid polarization among the political parties.

Regarding the election of a new prosecutor general, Bozhanov said the coalition will propose changes to the Judiciary Act and the Anti-Money Laundering Measures Act, so that Peevski's influence is limited and the sanctions under the Magnitsky Act are actually implemented. “We intend to set up an ad-hoc committee in the 51st National Assembly to investigate all election manipulations,” Bozhanov added.

“We have seen what happened with the MRF after Peevski was put in a more leading position, we do not want this to be the fate of democracy in the National Assembly,” Nikolay Denkov said.

Atanas Atanasov said that there would be no compromises with the conditions in the proposed anti-Peevski declaration. He pointed out that before talking about majorities and support for a cabinet, a new chair of the National Assembly must be elected. “The conditions in this declaration will be the first conditions for our position in the election of the new chair,” he added.