The serious incident on “Chelopeshko Shose“ once again focused attention on the control of driver's licenses and the question of whether there is such a thing at all.
A week ago, after the serious accident in which four people died, it became clear that the two drivers accused of the tragic incident were driving with Czech licenses.
Georgi Semerdzhiev also had a license from another country, which turned out to be fake. While driving on a capital boulevard, the car hit a taxi and an elevator leading to a nearby metro station, and split in half. This caused the deaths of two women. A year ago, he received a 20-year prison sentence.
These cases once again raise the questions of how it happens driving license in our country and why you have to go to another country to get a driving license.
Iveta Gerdzhikova is on her last driving lesson and will soon take the exam.
„Today is the last driving lesson I have. I think the lessons are a little less than we, the student drivers, need. But in the range I have, I managed to learn“, said Iveta, who is a student from Plovdiv.
„I hope that if there are no dangerous situations sometimes created by the other participants who do not take much care of the training cars, that she will cope“, commented Dafin Urdazhiev, a driving instructor and owner of a driving school in Plovdiv.
Iveta knows the traffic rules, but she is worried about the behavior of the other drivers on the road.
„Even in the public transport that exists in Plovdiv, the drivers are quite nervous, the atmosphere is also like that. And very often there are violations on the road“, explained Iveta.
„I feel calm when I drive“, she shared. When asked what the most important lesson she understood from her instructor was, Iveta replied: „I always have to be calm and watch the movement of other cars around me“.
Dafin Urdazhiev has been a driving instructor for 45 years. According to him, today's students do not like to read and have more problems with leaflets.
„The students come out a little less theoretically prepared. In practice, they are more busy. Now the traffic is very intense. And I think that the classes are not quite enough, to let them into this intense traffic“, explained Urdazhiev.
The choice of a driver's license outside the country has several explanations.
“Most likely there are only two reasons. Either his usual residence is there, or the lower standards in education than those set in Bulgaria - the 10th grade is mandatory“, pointed out Dafin Urdazhiev.
“A person will probably get a license abroad more easily. And here the law gives him the right to replace it, without requiring him to have an education“, commented Urdazhiev.
“You have the right to drive for 6 months with an EU license. After 6 months you must get a Bulgarian license. When you go to get a Bulgarian document, you must present a diploma“, said road expert Diana Rusinova from the European Center for Transport policies.
According to her, if checks were carried out constantly, such unscrupulous drivers would be easily detected.
„We have an enormous number of loopholes in the chain. If someone stops to check you, they will catch you, but they may not do so for several years - as with Semerdzhiev and those two who caused the accident on „Chelopeshko Shosse“, commented Rusinova.
She defines the main reason for road injuries as the feeling of impunity.
„If you go for a walk, you will see stopped cars at intersections, on sidewalks, everywhere. And from one small violation you start making bigger and bigger ones“, believes Rusinova.
According to her, this year there have been 26 more deaths on the roads than last year.
Earlier this week, the Minister of Internal Affairs Ivan Demerdzhiev ordered an inspection of drivers with licenses from countries that issue licenses with a simplified regime.