AMID continuing pressure on Bulgaria’s major political parties to form a coalition Cabinet, for the sake of political stability and to get on with urgent business related to European Union accession, the two largest parties remained deadlocked on issues as profound as which party should name the Prime Minister.
While, after a round of trilateral talks on July 6 between the Bulgarian Socialist Party, National Movement Simeon II, and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, the parties said that they did not discuss the question of the premiership, the BSP subsequently insisted that the NMSII was adamant about naming Simeon Saxe-Coburg to a second term in office.
“Honestly, we did not discuss this issue,” Saxe-Coburg said.
The BSP, which won the largest share of votes in the June 25 parliamentary elections – although its majority was not large enough to enable the party to form a government on its own – insisted that the Prime Minister’s post was its own by right.
Although there was no clear statement in public about the issues dividing the parties, it appeared that the question of portfolios was proving the largest stumbling block.
BSP leader Sergei Stanishev said: “I think that we agree that there are no insurmountable differences in the programmes of the parties”.
To clear the way for decisions on which parties would get which posts, it was agreed that draft documents on a coalition accord and a shared government legislative programme would be discussed at “expert” level by representatives of the three parties.
Saxe-Coburg said that it was important to him that the Cabinet be based on a large majority, and if possible, on a broad coalition.
NMSII deputy leader Nikolai Svinarov said that the alternative being proposed by the BSP for the Prime Minister’s post was not compatible with the view of the NMSII.
“We are prepared to participate in the government in the country and in forming the Cabinet, but not at any cost,” Svinarov said in an interview on July 6 with national private television station bTV.
He said that the NMSII favoured a coalition so broad as to include all parties represented in Parliament, with the exception of the ultra-nationalist coalition, Ataka.
Apart from the pressure from various circles on Bulgaria’s leaders to form a Cabinet, added impetus was lent by the decision by President Georgi Purvanov to summon the 40th National Assembly to hold its first sitting on Monday, July 11.
Some observers believed that a compromise scenario would, instead of placing Stanishev or Saxe-Coburg at the head of government, see someone else from the BSP becoming Prime Minister. It is well known that some within the BSP favour this scenario, and giving Stanishev the consolation prize of being Speaker of Parliament, a post that in Bulgarian constitutional protocol holds high rank.
After parties represented in Parliament met on July 6 to finalise various arrangements for the operation of the Assembly, the BSP announced that the new Speaker would come from its ranks. However, the party said that it would announce the name of its nominee only the day before the first sitting. (Full story, page 4).
Among those named as possible BSP candidates for the premiership were Kostadin Paskalev, a former minister in the NMSII government who returns to Parliament on the BSP list, and Kalin Mitrev, Bulgaria’s country representative at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
Chances of a compromise being reached on the post of Prime Minister before the first sitting of Parliament were not clear. After the abortive July 6 talks, highly-placed spokespeople close to Saxe-Coburg insisted that he was not dropping out of the contest to be Prime Minister.
Apart from the question of the premiership, there was also the matter of the various Cabinet posts. Tough negotiations were expected on issues like appointments to the “money ministries” such as Finance and the Economy, the question of who should take the Foreign Ministry, and to the social delivery portfolios such as Education and Health.
Agriculture was widely expected to be retained by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms.
MRF leader Ahmed Dogan has taken a firm line since the announcement of the election results that the BSP should be at the helm of the government, and the Prime Minister should be named by the BSP.