When Roumyana Zheleva was named in 2009 as Bulgaria’s candidate European Commissioner, she told journalists that she wanted to put Bulgaria at the centre of European affairs. She succeeded in this, but by no means in the way that she meant.

On the political balance sheet on the day Zheleva was out both as candidate Commissioner and as Foreign Minister, she was clearly the biggest loser, having also been the biggest liability for her political principals.

It was equivalent to someone in middle management having tried for promotion to senior executive level and, having failed in the interview, then found herself amid howls of derision so shrill and a level of discomfort so acute that she lost her original job.

That her political principals allowed the saga to drag on for so long seemed, in hindsight, almost cruel. After the fusillade at her January 12 hearing in the European Parliament, Zheleva was left to twitch and jerk for a week before the coup de grace was delivered.

Prime Minister Boiko Borissov and GERB, Bulgaria’s ruling party, suffered their first defeat. Even though it appeared – anecdotally – that their message that Zheleva had fallen victim to an unpatriotic plot by disgruntled socialists and liberals resonated among the Bulgarian public, it remains a fact that for the first time, Borissov’s uninterrupted arc had seen its first reverse. Two factors save this from utter disaster:

Kristalina Georgieva’s immediate credibility as Zheleva’s replacement as Commissioner-designate, and the way in which the final fall of Zheleva was presented as the work of the GERB parliamentary caucus, sparing Borissov the image of having vacillated about whether Zheleva should be dumped as Foreign Minister.

At European level, Borissov used up political credit in keeping European Commission President Jose Barroso and the European People’s Party (EPP) on board in backing Zheleva. For detractors of Barroso and the political rivals of the EPP, Zheleva was a handy stick to lay about vigorously. Barroso laboured through guarded defences of Zheleva, clearly not relishing the role.

Borissov, on becoming Prime Minister in July 2009, as during his election campaign, had as one of his key messages his goal of building up Bulgaria’s image in the eyes of its EU partners.

Bulgaria could hardly have a worse image in the continental European and British media, sections of which are so hostile as to tip into outright bias, but Zheleva served as a pack animal for critical journalists to trot out every nasty stereotype they could about the country.

The winners?
Zheleva may have served as an Aunt Sally for Barroso and the EPP’s political enemies, but she also served – however unwittingly or unwillingly – as the poster person for the effectiveness of the Lisbon Treaty-era European Parliament.

Zheleva was the most extreme example, although not the only one, that prospective Commissioners should not expect confirmation hearings to be cosy fireside chats, but may on occasion somewhat more resemble a blood sport arena.

It is true that the socialists, liberals and Greens in the European Parliament took a scalp, but it is also true that the Parliament itself emerged as appearing anything but supine to the will of the European Commission’s leaders.

At both European and Bulgarian level, there were individual political parties and politicians that made gains from the Zheleva saga, although some of these gains may prove fleeting.

It may prove brief, but Bulgaria’s National Movement for Stability and Progress, obliterated in national elections in 2009 although it has some MEPs, regained the national spotlight. MEP Antonia Purvanova got national attention, and GERB and the EPP had to devote some energy to painting her as the Cruella de Ville of the piece. Even NMSP former ministers Gergana and Solomon Passi regained some media attention.

On the socialist front, former foreign minister Ivailo Kalfin returned to breakfast television and found his phone ringing more often. Towards the end of his railings against Zheleva,  Kalfin displayed a killer instinct that hardly had been evident when he was still in office as his country’s chief representative in foreign parts.

There was a perk of interest in some MEPs, notably Netherlands Greens’ Judith Sargentini, whose performance as inquisitor-in-chief was stellar and which won her a place in the extracts of the hearings posted on YouTube, no harmful thing for a youthful and clearly bright politician.

The media gained too, not only in having a colourful smorgasbord laid before it from as unlikely a source as the European Parliament, not hitherto known as a pantry stocked with spice, but also because, to the extent the media can serve as an accurate barometer of public opinion, there was scant sympathy for the plight of Zheleva.

Few in the Bulgarian media rallied to her cause; just one newspaper ran pro-Zheleva stories daily, to no effect against the damage done by other reporting, whatever the motives and sources for that reporting may have been.

The long term may see more winners, even among those who currently appear to have been damaged. Borissov will bear no long-term scars as he reasserts himself, and GERB no doubt has learnt a few lessons about practical politics at EU level. In Bulgaria, municipal and presidential elections are more than a year away; no gains or losses from the Zheleva saga are likely to endure until then.