Over the past ten years, attempts have been made to control the Ministry of Interior system purely politically. This was stated to the Bulgarian National Radio by Tsvetan Tsvetanov, former Minister of Interior.
"I did not undertake political appointments, but left in the most key directorates employees who were appointed by Mihail Mikov. But then there was an understanding that the system must be controlled. We do not have parliamentary control that would focus attention on specific cases that the public should be familiar with," the former Minister of Interior noted.
"We see a situation in which the political leadership is unable to define specific messages and policies that should have been implemented. Daniel Mitov has been minister for more than half a year. This should have been planned in the first month of his term. A Minister of Internal Affairs must demand and control the implementation of management decisions, to ensure that society will receive a better service "Security".
Tsvetanov commented on the cases of police violence: "It becomes a symptom that cannot be solved overnight if there is no knowledge and political will. And this is also related to the personnel appointments at the highest levels of the Ministry of Internal Affairs".
He reminded that the department has not had a Secretary General for a year: "The demotivation in the system is enormous. In today's situation, I don't know how the Ministry of Internal Affairs could work effectively, because there is a huge deficit – the criminal contingent has not been made known and this reflects on the fight against crime".
Tsvetan Tsvetanov believes that the presence of body cameras will significantly assist the work of law enforcement officers.
"When a police officer is wearing a body camera, he will be able to guarantee both his professional actions and the responses of the person who must be detained. If there was a body camera when Yavor was detained, today we would be talking differently. If there is a person who is naked to the waist, this means that he does not have an object with which to show aggression towards the police officers. What then requires this aggression during the detention, given that the police officers even begin to communicate with him at the beginning?! We must be uncompromising towards the professional actions of the police officers," the former interior minister also said.