Comment by Veselin Stoynev:
We are faced with the unprecedented problem not of whether the new parliament in Bulgaria can give birth to a government, but of whether it can work at all. The blockage is based on a constitutional crisis that prevents even new elections from being scheduled, because there is no way to spin the parliamentary roulette with the mandates for the cabinet, because a speaker of the National Assembly cannot be elected and it cannot be constituted, even just to end itself.
The paralysis is the result of an unbearable love political quadrangle, in which the second political force demands guarantees from the first to detach itself from the fourth, and the first pushes the second towards a relationship with the third: PP-DB imposes a cordon sanitaire on GERB against incest with DPS-New Beginning, and GERB wants to catch PP-DB in adultery with “Vazrazhdane“ in order to hide its own sinful doom. In other words, it is shameful for GERB to be with DPS-New Beginning, and even with it alone it does not have a majority. It is a shame for PP-DB to be with “Vazrazhdane“, but without it there is no alternative majority.
Which party will blink first
In this partnership deception between the first and second forces, which are not wanted, but must be taken, it is important who will blink first. Unable to end his incest with Delyan Peevski, Boyko Borisov has been kicking the ball for two weeks to accuse PP-DB of false jealousy. And PP-DB, wearing the noose of the cordon sanitaire, was waiting for Borisov as the winner to take the first step and invite it to a new wedding dance.
But as usual, the first to blink was the co-chairman of PP Asen Vassilev, who said that he personally had no desire to govern with GERB. This gave GERB a reason to harden its course on Monday – Raya Nazaryan remains a candidate for parliamentary speaker, Boyko Borisov remains a candidate for prime minister, and there will be no leadership talks with the PP-DB outside of these conditions, or at all, because there are too many of its leaders and they want to bully the autochthonous leader of the winners.
Borisov waited for his small reason to refuse to lead the dance - Vassilev's personal opinion that he would not. Although Vassilev, again with a "personal" leadership opinion, taken out of brackets from the opinion of the entire coalition, had said even before the assembly - never with GERB or with a GERB mandate, and shortly before its dissolution he declared Maria Gabriel the beautiful face of the mafia. And this inviolable frivolity of his in a regime of unceasing relapse in front of the cameras has long ceased to seem so innocent to many in the coalition, who are solemnly behind its brackets.
The one - step back, the rest – in place
However, PP-DB decided to take a step back in the name of parliamentarism and withdraw its candidate for chairman Andrey Tsekov, announcing that they will support the oldest MP, the candidate of ITN Silvi Kirilov, for technical chairman. GERB, however, is not giving up on Nazaryan, which means that Kirilov can be elected only with the decisive votes of “Vazrazhdane“, as long as, in addition to ITN, the BSP also agrees and gives up its Natalia Kiselova. Which is also Borisov's goal – to expose the Euro-Atlantic democrats that this time they have settled for “Vazrazhdane“. In order to avoid this trap, “Yes, Bulgaria“ immediately announced a position that they will not participate in a majority for the election of a chairman, which depends on “Vazrazhdane“. It's good that "Vazrazhdane" itself did not give up on its candidate Petar Petrov, otherwise the PP-DB coalition would have split, but it is still unclear what will happen at the last moment in the plenary hall.
Hostages of the strategy "the chairman means a majority"
In the battle for the parliamentary chairman, the first and second political forces relied entirely on the strategy that his election means a governing majority and came to a zero result. GERB wanted to achieve a majority by choosing its candidate, which would hide the distinction from Peevski, who formally does not belong to it. PP-DB wanted to ensure by choosing a speaker that Peevski was not hidden behind this majority, but with the absence of GERB in it, this meant a majority with “Vazrazhdane“.
And because both parties deeply distrust that they will be partners in a government, their strategies for majorities around the speaker actually represented smoke screens for who would be to blame for the lack of government. While normal parliamentarism requires that the speaker of parliament be only part of an overall agreement for a governing majority or at least not be an obstacle at the start, while attempts are underway to construct it - then it does not matter whether he is from the first force, from the smallest, the oldest or even chosen by lot.
In the trap of their own constitutional changes
However, we are now also faced with a deep institutional problem, for which the same political forces that voted for the changes to the constitution bear direct responsibility. According to the amendments, firstly, the parliament must work even during scheduled elections and a caretaker government. Even if it comes to a referral to the Constitutional Court and it says that even without a parliamentary speaker being elected, the parliamentary roulette wheel can be turned, the parliament must work, and this cannot happen without a speaker. Secondly, the speaker of the National Assembly is among the potential caretaker prime ministers. And the so-called The House Book is now completely empty: the possibility of nominating the Governor and Deputy Governors of the BNB has been eliminated, there is no Ombudsman or Deputy Ombudsman, the Chairman of the Chamber of Accounts Dimitar Glavchev is not wanted by everyone to take up the post for a third time, his deputy Goritsa Grancharova-Kozhareva has already been rejected by the president due to her unwillingness to get rid of the Minister of Interior Kalin Stoyanov, and only the other Deputy Chairman of the Chamber, Toshko Todorov, remains, who refused before Grancharova.
Almost all accomplices in it will bear the blame for the suicidal end of the 51st National Assembly, with the greatest blame being on the largest political force. The bigger question is, how much worse can the next parliament be? Or will the time come for the fulfillment of the biblical phrase uttered by a parliamentary speaker nearly three decades ago in a burst of revelation about the reformers who had changed their tune after 1989: “We have all sinned and together we have become useless“.