Ognyan Minchev is the head of the Institute for Regional and International Studies (IRIS) in Sofia - an independent NGO think tank. It was established on June 11, 1997 by leading Bulgarian public and political figures, NGO leaders and prominent Bulgarian scholars in international relations, Balkan studies, history, social and political science, anthropology and economics.
The Institute for Regional and International Studies initiates, develops and implements civic strategies for democratic politics on national, regional and international level. The Institute promotes the values of democracy, civil society, freedom and respect of law, assists the process of Bulgarian integration into NATO and the EU and provides public policy analysis of current domestic and international issues.
Minchev spoke to CHRISTINA DIMITROVA about the crises and processes in the major right-wing party in Bulgaria, the Union of Democratic Forces (UDF).
THE UDF was established as a common denominator of opposition groups at the very beginning of the democratic transition.
For this reason, the crises in the first phase of its existence were, above all, the crises to be expected of a structure operating with very loose co-ordination, within which various ideological persuasions were co-existing.
This relative degree of decentralisation meant that every time one or another group achieved dominance, this automatically spawned a further crisis.
The first major crisis happened when the new constitution was approved in the summer of 1991. Thirty-nine MPs left Parliament in protest.
They formed the backbone, as it turned out later, of the UDF. They kept the "three letters" and the loyalty of the bulk of voters that supported the blue - blue being the colour that became associated with the UDF - coalition.
The second crisis, or to be more precise, series of crises in 1992 was connected to the premature resignation of then prime minister and leader of UDF, Philip Dimitrov, and the conflict with then President Zhelyu Zhelev who was elected with the votes of the UDF supporters.
Unlike the previous crisis, which arose from ideological disputes, this crisis was a classic power struggle, a contest between president and prime minister about who would hold sway over which areas of government.
All that followed in the story of the UDF to the present day has a common theme, that of the gradual centralisation of the UDF.
The so-called "flakings" in 1993 to 1994 were a part of a determined effort by the co-ordination committee and the party leadership to exercise tighter control over the formulation of policies of the coalition.
But these "flakings" also led ultimately to crisis of confidence in the concept that the UDF could act as a unified political force. This crisis was manifested during the elections at the end of 1994, when the UDF got relatively the smallest number of votes - about 24 per cent of all cast ballots.
The second phase of the development of the UDF began in the spring of 1997, with its creation of as a unified and centralised party.
This move towards centralisation and a hierarchy were meant to enable the UDF to be able, when moving into government, to effectively implement the changes that had been promised since the early 1990s, but which had not taken place.
The current crisis in UDF is, in reality, related to the problems intrinsic to this centralised model of party structure.
The true beginnings of the crisis were after the municipal elections in 1999, when disputes broke out between the party leadership and the then government. This catalyst for the conflict were that, allegedly, many ministers in the then government as well as leaders of the UDF were involved in nepotism in regard to the privatisation of state property and the process of control and redistribution of the resources through this privatisation.
The UDF lost power in 2001 due to the combined effect of the burden of the economic reforms on the shoulders of ordinary people, and the damage to the legitimacy of the blue government caused by corruption and nepotism.
While there have been various stages of the crisis within the UDF, as a whole it is a crisis of, on one side, fulfillment of a common goal - the positive aim of reforming Bulgarian society. But the other, negative side has been the drop in the moral legitimacy of the UDF as the political force representing the determination to reform Bulgaria.
The main traits of the current crisis are not based on political or ideological differences. It is a personal attack against Nadezhda Mihailova who is being accused of being unable to fulfill her commitments as leader of the UDF.
This criticism is to a certain extent justified, because in her first year and a half as party leader, she has made no effort to change it, either in terms of organisation, or in terms of its ideology and policies.
In the meantime, however, it must be taken into account that this criticism was not caused by matters of principle. It is related to the fact that a certain group of MPs and party activists connected to former UDF leader Ivan Kostov ultimately want to regain outright control of the party.
During the first phase of the Mihailova's leadership, Kostov and the people around him were able to indirectly control the processes in UDF and to exercise influence over the new party leadership.
But, over time, this control diminished, spurring the conflict between the old and new leadership out into the open.
The entire controversy over the allegedly falsified signature of Dimitar Abadjiev on the party statutes is a rather indecent manipulation, planted two years ago when the statutes were discussed and approved. Apparently someone replaced the last two lines of this notorious article with the idea of using it to discredit someone else at a later stage.
There is not the slightest chance for the two enemy camps in UDF to come to terms with each other, but they surely know that their future outside the UDF is not rosy at all. It is very likely the conflict will continue to smoulder within the party.
It is possible for the group around Kostov to split off and form a new party, but only on condition that Kostov himself becomes its leader. With figureheads for leaders, this party would never be able to exist successfully outside the UDF - its sphere of influence lies among those who are personally loyal to Kostov and who believe that he is the person and leader worth supporting. No figurehead would be able to attract votes.
On the other hand, Mihailova has survived so far as party leader, in this turbulent time for the UDF, because she is able to strike a balance among the various groups within the party. If she loses the support of the other group, the way she completely lost the support of the Kostov wing, we might expect that she will become fully dependent on the group around the MP from Razgrad, Nikola Nikolov, which would not be beneficial for the UDF.
The only favourable outcome of the conference in February would be if Mihailova finds a mode of coexistence of the groups within the party, if she finds way to give all groups within the UDF a chance to manifest their political identity, without splits, and without hostilities with the other factions.
This is not only a matter of organisational structure, but also a matter of a certain political culture.
But in any case, the leader of the UDF after the conference will be Nadezhda Mihailova.
The question about the chances of Kostov to win the battle reminds me of the joke about the man who was praying to God to win the jackpot of the lottery and after five or six prayers God told him "Give me a single chance and buy a ticket".
In order for Kostov to win the leader's position, he must stand as a candidate, but he has no intention to do so.
It is too early to tell with certainty what the chances are of one party or another to win the next elections for Parliament. It is true that in its current shape, the UDF has no chance of becoming the majority party.
In the meantime, however, the party currently leading in the opinion polls, the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), is also in a very deep political crisis, even though this is not as public. The support for the BSP is capped, and does not rise above the low end of the 20 per cent range.
The municipal elections last autumn showed that along with the vast majority of disillusioned voters, the people who are still willing to vote and do so, are more inclined to vote for a moderate centrist to right party instead of supporting new experiments led by the BSP.
So, if the UDF somehow manages to resolve its internal controversies and manages to establish the respective balance with other considerable, though smaller groups standing right-of-centre, it is possible that the configuration in the next Parliament will enable the formation of a centre-right government.
Apparently in the UDF there are different opinions about the National Movement Simeon II (NMSII) and whether it is the main enemy or not, but the self-definition of NMSII as centre-right is not a good enough reason for co-operation.
What is more likely to happen after the end of the term of the current Parliament, or after its premature end, is for the NMSII to complete its internal fragmentation.
If some major new centre-right groups appear after this, and they manage to pass the four per cent threshold, then there might appear the possibility of a coalition of right-of-centre parties, consisting of the current ones and the NMSII or some of its former members.
But actually the NMSII cannot split because there is no such thing. It exists only in name, as an already void political project of Simeon Saxe-Coburg.
And we can already observe its fragmentation into various groupings, which do not have much in common.
The UDF was a symbol of the past decade. Even if it does not split, from the way it is evolving now we could say that it could remain one of the leading right-wing parties, but it won't be the only one, the way it was in the 1990s.
If, however, it splits, this will mean that it will spawn two or more small political forces, which will not be much different from the other small right-of-centre political groups. This would lead to the complete fragmentation and loss of scope of the right-centre and in the foreseeable political future it would not be able to govern the country efficiently.
From such political processes, no political party would profit; but the recently formed political-economic oligarchy, which is a specific union between the organised crime business and corrupt networks within the state institutions, would profit.
They want to expand their opportunities to exploit the resources of the country, without being bothered by legitimate political parties, factors and institutions, which are an obstacle to the successful activities of organised crime and its political protectors, which together form this oligarchy.
Currently there is no chance that the next government will be dominated by a single party. Moreover, no matter if it will be left or right of centre, it will continue the trend of the country to be governed by relatively weak and not very efficient governments, like those of Lyuben Berov, and of Saxe-Coburg.
I cannot make very optimistic forecasts regarding the next government. My optimism comes from the hope that the membership of Bulgaria in the EU will bring in a powerful external factor in the Bulgarian politics - the framework, which Brussels will impose on the economic processes.
We, however, cannot say that UDF was a complete failure in opposition, it just has very low efficiency as such. By the way, the BSP was not very efficient either.
But this government, which is probably the weakest in the 15 years of democracy in the country, is still in power only because the opposition parties are inefficient and unable to present a sensible and viable alternative for government.
I cannot say what this entire story around the Democracy Foundation was about - it clearly has to do with the origin of the money given to it by the Cyprus offshore company and the way it was spent. I cannot say what the official outcome of the investigation would be either - we'll have to wait for its end.
The political fallout from the affair, however, was that it deepened the antagonism among the groups in the UDF, and posed a serious dilemma to the organisation - whether the UDF should support its former leader Kostov and the foundation headed by him, or whether it should distance itself from them.
The bad thing is that this dilemma arose at the height of the municipal election campaign, and aggravated hostilities in the UDF.
I cannot say what the role of (former UDF deputy leader) Ekaterina Mihailova was in the current conflict in the UDF - I do not have direct impressions from her activities in the leadership in the party. Personally I know her as an honest person and a devoted and responsible leader of the UDF.
It is apparent that her personal relations with Nadezhda Mihailova and the relations between the former party leadership of which Ekaterina Mihailova was a member and the new one are not good, but I cannot say that Ekaterina Mihailova had a dishonest role in the conflict or that she was a "Trojan Horse".
Apart from surviving as a single party, the challenges ahead of the UDF are for it to reinstitute itself as the leading right-wing political force with a vision for the development of the country after the end of the post-communist transition and to become able to persuade the majority of people in the country that this is the correct vision for the favourable development of Bulgaria.
The Institute for Regional and International Studies initiates, develops and implements civic strategies for democratic politics on national, regional and international level. The Institute promotes the values of democracy, civil society, freedom and respect of law, assists the process of Bulgarian integration into NATO and the EU and provides public policy analysis of current domestic and international issues.
Minchev spoke to CHRISTINA DIMITROVA about the crises and processes in the major right-wing party in Bulgaria, the Union of Democratic Forces (UDF).
THE UDF was established as a common denominator of opposition groups at the very beginning of the democratic transition.
For this reason, the crises in the first phase of its existence were, above all, the crises to be expected of a structure operating with very loose co-ordination, within which various ideological persuasions were co-existing.
This relative degree of decentralisation meant that every time one or another group achieved dominance, this automatically spawned a further crisis.
The first major crisis happened when the new constitution was approved in the summer of 1991. Thirty-nine MPs left Parliament in protest.
They formed the backbone, as it turned out later, of the UDF. They kept the "three letters" and the loyalty of the bulk of voters that supported the blue - blue being the colour that became associated with the UDF - coalition.
The second crisis, or to be more precise, series of crises in 1992 was connected to the premature resignation of then prime minister and leader of UDF, Philip Dimitrov, and the conflict with then President Zhelyu Zhelev who was elected with the votes of the UDF supporters.
Unlike the previous crisis, which arose from ideological disputes, this crisis was a classic power struggle, a contest between president and prime minister about who would hold sway over which areas of government.
All that followed in the story of the UDF to the present day has a common theme, that of the gradual centralisation of the UDF.
The so-called "flakings" in 1993 to 1994 were a part of a determined effort by the co-ordination committee and the party leadership to exercise tighter control over the formulation of policies of the coalition.
But these "flakings" also led ultimately to crisis of confidence in the concept that the UDF could act as a unified political force. This crisis was manifested during the elections at the end of 1994, when the UDF got relatively the smallest number of votes - about 24 per cent of all cast ballots.
The second phase of the development of the UDF began in the spring of 1997, with its creation of as a unified and centralised party.
This move towards centralisation and a hierarchy were meant to enable the UDF to be able, when moving into government, to effectively implement the changes that had been promised since the early 1990s, but which had not taken place.
The current crisis in UDF is, in reality, related to the problems intrinsic to this centralised model of party structure.
The true beginnings of the crisis were after the municipal elections in 1999, when disputes broke out between the party leadership and the then government. This catalyst for the conflict were that, allegedly, many ministers in the then government as well as leaders of the UDF were involved in nepotism in regard to the privatisation of state property and the process of control and redistribution of the resources through this privatisation.
The UDF lost power in 2001 due to the combined effect of the burden of the economic reforms on the shoulders of ordinary people, and the damage to the legitimacy of the blue government caused by corruption and nepotism.
While there have been various stages of the crisis within the UDF, as a whole it is a crisis of, on one side, fulfillment of a common goal - the positive aim of reforming Bulgarian society. But the other, negative side has been the drop in the moral legitimacy of the UDF as the political force representing the determination to reform Bulgaria.
The main traits of the current crisis are not based on political or ideological differences. It is a personal attack against Nadezhda Mihailova who is being accused of being unable to fulfill her commitments as leader of the UDF.
This criticism is to a certain extent justified, because in her first year and a half as party leader, she has made no effort to change it, either in terms of organisation, or in terms of its ideology and policies.
In the meantime, however, it must be taken into account that this criticism was not caused by matters of principle. It is related to the fact that a certain group of MPs and party activists connected to former UDF leader Ivan Kostov ultimately want to regain outright control of the party.
During the first phase of the Mihailova's leadership, Kostov and the people around him were able to indirectly control the processes in UDF and to exercise influence over the new party leadership.
But, over time, this control diminished, spurring the conflict between the old and new leadership out into the open.
The entire controversy over the allegedly falsified signature of Dimitar Abadjiev on the party statutes is a rather indecent manipulation, planted two years ago when the statutes were discussed and approved. Apparently someone replaced the last two lines of this notorious article with the idea of using it to discredit someone else at a later stage.
There is not the slightest chance for the two enemy camps in UDF to come to terms with each other, but they surely know that their future outside the UDF is not rosy at all. It is very likely the conflict will continue to smoulder within the party.
It is possible for the group around Kostov to split off and form a new party, but only on condition that Kostov himself becomes its leader. With figureheads for leaders, this party would never be able to exist successfully outside the UDF - its sphere of influence lies among those who are personally loyal to Kostov and who believe that he is the person and leader worth supporting. No figurehead would be able to attract votes.
On the other hand, Mihailova has survived so far as party leader, in this turbulent time for the UDF, because she is able to strike a balance among the various groups within the party. If she loses the support of the other group, the way she completely lost the support of the Kostov wing, we might expect that she will become fully dependent on the group around the MP from Razgrad, Nikola Nikolov, which would not be beneficial for the UDF.
The only favourable outcome of the conference in February would be if Mihailova finds a mode of coexistence of the groups within the party, if she finds way to give all groups within the UDF a chance to manifest their political identity, without splits, and without hostilities with the other factions.
This is not only a matter of organisational structure, but also a matter of a certain political culture.
But in any case, the leader of the UDF after the conference will be Nadezhda Mihailova.
The question about the chances of Kostov to win the battle reminds me of the joke about the man who was praying to God to win the jackpot of the lottery and after five or six prayers God told him "Give me a single chance and buy a ticket".
In order for Kostov to win the leader's position, he must stand as a candidate, but he has no intention to do so.
It is too early to tell with certainty what the chances are of one party or another to win the next elections for Parliament. It is true that in its current shape, the UDF has no chance of becoming the majority party.
In the meantime, however, the party currently leading in the opinion polls, the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), is also in a very deep political crisis, even though this is not as public. The support for the BSP is capped, and does not rise above the low end of the 20 per cent range.
The municipal elections last autumn showed that along with the vast majority of disillusioned voters, the people who are still willing to vote and do so, are more inclined to vote for a moderate centrist to right party instead of supporting new experiments led by the BSP.
So, if the UDF somehow manages to resolve its internal controversies and manages to establish the respective balance with other considerable, though smaller groups standing right-of-centre, it is possible that the configuration in the next Parliament will enable the formation of a centre-right government.
Apparently in the UDF there are different opinions about the National Movement Simeon II (NMSII) and whether it is the main enemy or not, but the self-definition of NMSII as centre-right is not a good enough reason for co-operation.
What is more likely to happen after the end of the term of the current Parliament, or after its premature end, is for the NMSII to complete its internal fragmentation.
If some major new centre-right groups appear after this, and they manage to pass the four per cent threshold, then there might appear the possibility of a coalition of right-of-centre parties, consisting of the current ones and the NMSII or some of its former members.
But actually the NMSII cannot split because there is no such thing. It exists only in name, as an already void political project of Simeon Saxe-Coburg.
And we can already observe its fragmentation into various groupings, which do not have much in common.
The UDF was a symbol of the past decade. Even if it does not split, from the way it is evolving now we could say that it could remain one of the leading right-wing parties, but it won't be the only one, the way it was in the 1990s.
If, however, it splits, this will mean that it will spawn two or more small political forces, which will not be much different from the other small right-of-centre political groups. This would lead to the complete fragmentation and loss of scope of the right-centre and in the foreseeable political future it would not be able to govern the country efficiently.
From such political processes, no political party would profit; but the recently formed political-economic oligarchy, which is a specific union between the organised crime business and corrupt networks within the state institutions, would profit.
They want to expand their opportunities to exploit the resources of the country, without being bothered by legitimate political parties, factors and institutions, which are an obstacle to the successful activities of organised crime and its political protectors, which together form this oligarchy.
Currently there is no chance that the next government will be dominated by a single party. Moreover, no matter if it will be left or right of centre, it will continue the trend of the country to be governed by relatively weak and not very efficient governments, like those of Lyuben Berov, and of Saxe-Coburg.
I cannot make very optimistic forecasts regarding the next government. My optimism comes from the hope that the membership of Bulgaria in the EU will bring in a powerful external factor in the Bulgarian politics - the framework, which Brussels will impose on the economic processes.
We, however, cannot say that UDF was a complete failure in opposition, it just has very low efficiency as such. By the way, the BSP was not very efficient either.
But this government, which is probably the weakest in the 15 years of democracy in the country, is still in power only because the opposition parties are inefficient and unable to present a sensible and viable alternative for government.
I cannot say what this entire story around the Democracy Foundation was about - it clearly has to do with the origin of the money given to it by the Cyprus offshore company and the way it was spent. I cannot say what the official outcome of the investigation would be either - we'll have to wait for its end.
The political fallout from the affair, however, was that it deepened the antagonism among the groups in the UDF, and posed a serious dilemma to the organisation - whether the UDF should support its former leader Kostov and the foundation headed by him, or whether it should distance itself from them.
The bad thing is that this dilemma arose at the height of the municipal election campaign, and aggravated hostilities in the UDF.
I cannot say what the role of (former UDF deputy leader) Ekaterina Mihailova was in the current conflict in the UDF - I do not have direct impressions from her activities in the leadership in the party. Personally I know her as an honest person and a devoted and responsible leader of the UDF.
It is apparent that her personal relations with Nadezhda Mihailova and the relations between the former party leadership of which Ekaterina Mihailova was a member and the new one are not good, but I cannot say that Ekaterina Mihailova had a dishonest role in the conflict or that she was a "Trojan Horse".
Apart from surviving as a single party, the challenges ahead of the UDF are for it to reinstitute itself as the leading right-wing political force with a vision for the development of the country after the end of the post-communist transition and to become able to persuade the majority of people in the country that this is the correct vision for the favourable development of Bulgaria.
