The new composition of the Central Election Commission (CEC) officially takes office on Tuesday, informs bTV. This happens after President Iliana Yotova signed the decree on the appointment of the new members proposed by the parliamentaryly represented parties and coalitions in the 52nd National Assembly.
The new team of the election administration takes office at a key moment, and the main challenge before it will be to strengthen the institutional authority and guarantee transparency in future votes.
The new composition includes Georgi Horozov as the Chairman of the Commission, and his deputies are Ismail Osman and Margarita Makhaeva. The Secretary of the CEC is Yordanka Gancheva, and the members of the Commission are Alina Dobreva, Anna Alexandrova, Vyara Todeva, Georgi Bakhanov, Desislava Abrasheva, Zinaida Zlatanova, Ivan Karchev, Yordan Vassilev, Lazarina Boneva-Haralampieva, Stoyanka Balova-Tsvetkova and Tsvetan Enchev.
The official inauguration took place after a public procedure that started at the end of May. On June 9, President Iliana Yotova held official consultations with the parliamentary forces to submit nominations.
During the talks, the Head of State outlined the strategic importance of the Commission. “The CEC is one of the institutions that underpin democratic processes. This is our right. It depends on you to what extent the institutions in our country will enjoy legitimacy. The most important thing you have to do is to restore the trust of Bulgarian citizens in the electoral process,“ Yotova said at the time.
Despite the consensual tone, the consultations also went through a serious debate on the distribution of party quotas. The President's Secretary for Legal Affairs, Prof. Evelina Dimitrova, signaled a case in which the “Progressive Bulgaria“ formation received 8 members, exceeding the legal ceiling of a maximum of 7 representatives for a political force.
This necessitated a redistribution of the remainders according to the methodology of the Electoral Code, which caused an exchange of remarks and legal interpretations between Bozhidar Bozhanov (DB), Stanislav Anastasov (DPS) and Petar Vitanov (“Progressive Bulgaria“). For his part, Prof. Kostadin Angelov (GERB) confirmed that the administration's calculations were made correctly and in accordance with the law.
After the candidates' documents were checked, a public hearing of the nominees for CEC members was held on June 12 at “Dondukov“ 2. During the hearing, the candidates presented their views on modernizing the vote and addressing the technical challenges surrounding the printing of ballots and machine voting. During the procedure, the new chairman Georgi Horozov stated categorically that the new commission has the capacity to ensure “a much more transparent election process“.
The new composition of the CEC begins work immediately with a focus on improving communication with the public and optimizing the election process. The mandate of the new commission will be closely watched by both political headquarters and civil society, in an attempt to finally close the debates surrounding vote security in Bulgaria.