Without ending the political merry-go-rounds and this politicization of the Ministry of Interior, we cannot have a rule of law.
This was stated to the Bulgarian National Radio by former Deputy Interior Minister Filip Gunev.
"Those who talk about restoring the rule of law, about changing the Prosecutor General and fixing the justice system - without ending these political merry-go-rounds and this politicization of the Ministry of Interior, we cannot have a rule of law. Even if we have the most perfect Prosecutor General and Prosecutor's Office, if you have a politicized police, there is no way you can achieve results in the fight against organized crime and corruption. Depoliticization is a complex change, but it is not unpredictable. The right of a minister to be able to make such deep political appointments, to be able to appoint and dismiss whoever he wants, must be taken away, and a system must be built where senior management personnel, including the Secretary General, I believe, should be appointed by parliament. Down in the system there must be real depoliticization, i.e. the right of political leadership to remove everyone in the system must be removed.
On the current personnel changes in the Ministry of Interior, Gunev commented:
"It has become some kind of inevitable evil. This is some kind of new system for managing the Ministry of Interior - politicized management, which we have been seeing for maybe 10-15 years. With the frequent political changes in the last 5-6 years, it is eye-popping. The problem there is, on the one hand, in scale. There are nearly 200 people in the team, and if you have to change it every year - that's exactly politicization.
Where there are risky sections and vote buying and if you suspect that there is a political appointment from the party that buys the most votes, it makes sense to make changes, explained the former deputy interior minister, but emphasized that now it is a question of changes in 23 out of 28 cities. The minister said that he is replacing them with people he trusts, he recalled in the program "Above All".
According to him, a change of the type - replacing a director with a deputy director, is not so destructive for the system. However, another change is:
"But when we have this unit to support the Minister of Interior, which is a kind of personnel freezer. Boyko Rashkov made it important because all the senior staff from the GERB era were sent there. No one can be fired without reason, just because you don't trust them. That's why the easier option is a reshuffle. But where you want to isolate him completely - from the regional directorate and from everything, then they send him to this unit. Now some of the people who are returning are those who were in the freezer, waiting for their turn, and they are being sent back into the system. In this unit at some point they didn't have office computers or anything - they sat and did nothing, they just received high salaries. If their psyche can handle not doing anything for a long enough time - some people can't stand it and leave the system, they wait their turn to return".
In his words, the third type of changes are "political elevators", when you don't walk the ladder of professional development and directly become a boss. According to him, this is destructive in the system. Then career growth occurs with political connections, Gunev specified and emphasized that we often observe this.
However, he believes that there is no way the system can continue to exist with such large-scale changes. In his words, this reduces trust in the Ministry of Interior:
"Those who are currently making the changes do not have the support of a large part of the population, who support their political opponents".
The society has an expectation to receive periodic information about the efforts being made in the "Petrohan" case, said Filip Gunev. According to him, it was inappropriate to release so much detailed information, which has increased conspiracies and distrust. He is not optimistic that the case will be resolved before the elections.
"The political interest of the prosecutor's office, part of its communication actions on this case, including the statements of Borislav Sarafov, were such a type of political intervention that showed that they were using the case for some of their political interests. At the moment, their silence until the elections would also be such a sign if they decided not to share anything anymore. This does not mean that they are not working on revealing the truth," he commented.
According to him, the prosecutor's office risks stopping its work because Minister Dechev will see and say. "There are many things that are being done. In this sense, he should be able to balance the information in parts, without revealing exactly what is being done, if the prosecutor's office does not allow it," the former deputy minister believes.
According to him, the truth and analysis of all these expert reports must be considered in revealing the motive. According to him, a much broader picture is needed before the case can be solved.
In front of Nova TV, Nikolay Zlatkov's mother announced that the relatives of those who died in the "Petrohan" case are organizing a protest next Friday, March 13. They are calling on people to support them.