Bulgaria Political Briefing: POLITICAL CRISIS in the BULGARIAN PARLIAMENT Evgeniy Kandilarov

Home , Elections in Bulgaria

ISSN: 2560-1601

Vol. 17, No. 1 (BG)

April 2019

Bulgaria political briefing: POLITICAL CRISIS IN THE BULGARIAN PARLIAMENT Evgeniy Kandilarov

1052 Budapest Petőfi Sándor utca 11.

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Kiadásért felelős személy: Huang Ping china-cee.eu 2017/01

POLITICAL CRISIS IN THE BULGARIAN PARLIAMENT

Already almost two months since from the Bulgarian Parliament is missing the largest opposition party which is Bulgarian Socialist Party. That creates a situation questioning the stability and the legitimacy of the main democratic principles of the functioning of the Parliament which is the highest organ of state authority since according to the Bulgarian Constitution the country is a Parliament Republic. How this extraordinary situation occurred and what will be the consequences from it? At the beginning of February, the ruling coalition headed by the biggest parliament party GERB pushed Bulgarian parliament to vote changes to the election rules. For many observers it is quite disturbing that these changes are issued three months before the EU elections so they have to be adopted very fast without time for public discussion and profound Parliamentary debate. The ruling coalition, supported by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRI), adopted texts that practically denigrates the existing preference technology for the election of MPs, MEPs and municipal councilors. This way the ruling coalition practically banned voters from rearranging the party’s lists for the elections. The amendment, which in fact revokes the preferential system, was imposed mainly with the votes of the ruling party GERB and the Turkish minority party MRI which in many cases is acting as an informal partner of Prime Minister Boyko Borissov. The proposals for the change states that the preferences will be only counted if the votes received for that candidate are at least the respective electoral quota. This means that a candidate for MP will have to collect between 9 and 12 thousand votes to shuffle the list, and for a MEP - between 130 and 15 thousand. This has sparked criticism from the BSP and non-parliamentary parties and has prompted street protests as well. Where the whole issue about the preference system of voting is coming from? In 2016 the Bulgarians supported with a huge majority the national referendum for the introduction of a majority system for the parliamentary elections. The referendum was organized at the initiative of showman Slavi Trifonov and his team. It fell short of a few thousand votes to oblige the National Assembly to change the law. GERB leader Boyko Borissov then promised that a law amendment introducing majority vote would be made. GERB proposed the amendments but the other parliamentary parties did not support them. Thus, the will of 2.5 million Bulgarians (out of 6 million with the right to vote) was disregarded. At that time there was well-founded criticism of the majority voting system. In the

Bulgarian context it favors three major parties – GERB, DPS and the socialist BSP, while smaller formations would have been excluded from the political process. The reason is that it is almost impossible for them to win 50% of the votes in the electoral districts. However, there was a back-up option for majority voting. The Bulgarian law provided a good opportunity for people to make changes to party lists via the preferential voting. For example, parties need 120,000 votes to send a representative to the European Parliament, but only 10,000 votes could change the party list ranking and send someone else. So the future MEP (provided he or she appears on the list) would be chosen by the people, instead of the party’s leadership. This was the strongest majority element in the Bulgarian electoral system. With the proposed law changes this year practically GERB has put an end to this single majority opportunity, with extreme political hypocrisy. The minimum number of votes for changing the party lists was increased more than tenfold. Thus, the preferential vote was practically eliminated. Borisov’s party demonstrated complete sheer disrespect for its own voters, given that 20% of the GERB MPs were elected by preferential vote at the last parliamentary elections. Changes concerning the validity of the preferences are unjustified from the point of view of democratic governance and the rule of law. The possibility of personal choice within a proportional electoral system, where political parties' participation is decisive, acts as a corrective of party hegemony that selects and arranges candidates. The main critics of the opposition against this changes in the election rules are that this way the voter was deprived of the right to make a preference, such a limit was introduced that cannot be achieved, namely the quota for the respective region. For example, in Bourgas a national representative is elected with about 11,500 votes, that is, in order to displace some preferentially the list, must get a minimum of 11,000 plus one preference, it's virtually impossible. The opposition argues that the regulations about the opportunity to use the preference should be such as to allow candidates to be re-listed. The change in this regulation in practice deprives citizens of a real opportunity to express their preferences despite party foundations. The issue of individual influence in the electoral process is particularly important as it relies on the people as a sovereign. For the single citizen the possibility of his voice being heard through the preference is a strong factor to vote, and hence the state authorities to derive their legitimacy, as required by the democratic state. Preferences are an established and recognized means by which the proportional electoral system can become more personal, albeit within the boundary of the supported party list.

Another change in the Election law that has been proposed and voted by the ruling coalition concerned the implementation of the machine voting which according to the Bulgarian Socialist party will be a strong guarantee against the possibility of falsifying election results. The advantages of machine voting, including the minimization of invalid ballots, are recognized in electoral theory and practice. Now the parliament voted that machine voting would be used in at least 3,000 out of about 12,400 voting precincts at the European Parliament elections. Some 6,000 voting precincts would be required to use voting machines at the municipal elections and a full switch to machine voting would be made at the next parliamentary elections in 2021. It means just a postponing the introduction of machine vote. The implementation of this change in the Election law gave reason of the BSP for strong criticism stating that GERB, with these actions, show that they do not want fair elections, that they are afraid of fair elections and post probably they want to manipulate in their way the election results. The third issue that triggered a huge political scandal was the decision of the government that the European elections in Bulgaria will be held under a Central Election Commission the mandate of which has expired. In this case the opposition in the face of the Bulgarian Socialist party had a very strong arguments consisting of the fact that in this case there is a violation of the law which cannot be explained another way except with the will of the government to keep its members because its composition is likely to be in favor of the ruling party at the moment. The criticism of the opposition was based on the argument that the election rules are designed to give legitimacy to power. When there are imperative norms in the law - when the electoral administration is replacing - this is not a formal rule and with its violation the citizens are losing confidence in the judicial system. They think that it is controlled rather by political and corporate interests than by democratic principles. All this gave a reason for the Bulgarian Socialist Party to take the decision to leave the Parliament showing that they doesn’t want to be part of such pseudo-Parliamentarism and to legitimize the acts of the ruling coalition with their presence. In the middle of February Bulgarian Socialist Party issued an address stating their arguments for this decision. According to the Socialists, the adoption of the Movement for Rights and Freedom's proposal for amendments to the Electoral Code by GERB, MRF and the National Front for the Salvation of Bulgaria (NFSB), violates the law, the free choice of Bulgarian citizens and the guarantees for fair elections. Instead of the changes being in line with democratic principles and enhancing democratic processes, the rules have been corrected to the detriment of Bulgarian citizens and their interest. It has been a vicious practice months before any election to adjust the rules in the interests of the government.

According to the opposition the changed rules threaten the democratic process of the electorate - now and in the future. That’s why the position of BSP was that they are leaving the parliamentary sessions to preserve parliamentarism in Bulgaria. Since then the opposition strongly insisted that the latest amendments to the Electoral Code be dropped and that the legal requirement to elect a new Central Electoral Commission is fulfilled. Generally speaking the socialists demand that they ensure the democratic holding of forthcoming elections to the European Parliament, ensure the credibility of the election results according to the will of the Bulgarian citizens, and consider a new CEC constituency as an important part of these guarantees. The position of the party government was that only in these circumstances they will go back and participate in this parliament. As the Socialists control 79 of the 240 seats in parliament, the move, approved by BSP’s national council threaten to lead to numbers in parliament more frequently falling short of those it needs to pass legislation. BSP leader Kornelia Ninova, criticized the ruling center-right coalition for failing to implement laws to improve the lives of Bulgarian citizens at a time when parliament’s approval ratings have hit a new low. Approval for the National Assembly fell to 8 percent in December 2018, a survey conducted by independent pollster Alpha Research showed. Another argument of BSP’s leadership was that there were no laws In the parliament but only "backstage party arrangements": "Instead of making real laws to improve the lives of Bulgarian citizens, a heavy lobbyism is made ... We have proposed our alternative with an alternative budget, with alternative laws, nothing of which is accepted… legislation was made “in the interests of companies and oligarchs, and behind-the-scenes party arrangements only in the interests of certain parties”, stated Kornelia Ninova. This move of the biggest opposition party in the Parliament as well as the veto of the President on the amendments of the Electoral Code made the government and the ruling coalition in the Parliament to take a step back and to agree for the election of a new Central Election Commission, and for a return to previous provisions on preferential voting. The argument of the Presidential veto on the law was that the proposed changes do not guarantee stability, predictability and equal rights, which are immutable requirements for the implementation of citizens' fundamental rights, including their right to vote. According to the leader of the socialists Cornelia Ninova the Electoral Code disputes have shown something far more serious about which the left-wing party has spoken, but it has now gained visibility and it is the issue about the backstage and the pattern of transition, in which all parties secretly negotiate for their own and party interest, somewhere in the dark, and the night time of adopting the Electoral Code is brilliant example of this negotiation. That gives a strong argument to the Socialist party that this model should be put to an end, the model of

4 transition and backstage should stop, and the open talks between the parties and the result of them must be placed on the table. That’s why the boycott of the BSP of the government coalition through their decision to leave the Parliament and to go and talk directly to the people continues. Most probably the opposition will not return to parliament until the EU elections. In general, Cornelia Ninova is trying to push the BSP on a new path in terms of a denial of the status quo. She says, "We are a denial of the status quo, we prefer to be out with our people." Whether this tactic will turn out to be profitable, it is difficult to get an answer right now. We will know this after the election, because that is when the picture will be clearer. Exiting parliament is a radical move. Opposition in other countries only resort to such practices when the degree of stress is high. In the Bulgarian case the situation is quite different but it can dynamically change. For sure the absence of BSP from Parliament could lead more frequent difficulties for the ruling coalition to pass legislation as the parliament’s regulations allow sessions to be held when at least 121 of the 240 MPs are present. So the absence of BSP is leaving Prime Minister Boyko Borissov’s ruling party more dependent on other small parties such as Volya and the MRI. As Gerb is fiercely denying any union with MRI despite numerous cases when the ethnic-Turk party has backed the ruling coalition or has passed controversial legislation, the absence of BSP is posing a challenge and could damage its already falling rating. At the same time tactically BSP take dividends which will be visible in May elections. Of course the biggest goal of the BSP is to to trigger early parliamentary elections following the point that The salvation of parliamentarianism goes through the dissolution of the National Assembly.