Bulgaria’s caretaker PM-designate Glavchev presents nominees for interim government

Bulgaria’s caretaker Prime Minister-designate Dimitar Glavchev presented on April 5 his nominees for the caretaker government that is to take office within days.

Prime Minister – Dimitar Glavchev

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance – Lyudmila Petkova

Interior – Kalin Stoyanov

Minister of Regional Development and Public Works – Violeta Koritarova

Minister of Labour and Social Policy – Ivaylo Ivanov

Minister of Defence – Gen. Atanas Zapryanov

Minister of Foreign Affairs – Ivaylo Varbanov Tsenov

Minister of Justice – Maria Pavlova

Minister of Education and Science – Galin Tsokov

Minister of Health – Galya Kondeva

Minister of Culture – Nayden Todorov

Minister of Environment and Water – Petar Dimitrov

Minister of Agriculture and Food – Kiril Vatev

Minister of Transport and Communications – Georgi Gvozdeikov

Minister of Economy and Industry – Petko Nikolov

Minister of Innovation and Growth – Rossen Karadimov

Minister of Energy – Vladimir Malinov

Minister of e-government – Valentin Mundrov

Minister of Tourism – Evtim Miloshev

Minister of Youth and Sports – Georgi Glushkov

The nominees for the Interior, Education, Agriculture and Transport portfolios are members of the Denkov Cabinet that office in June 2023.

Presenting the proposed line-up to President Roumen Radev, Glavchev said: “I have tried to have experts in the cabinet, to have continuity and to be politically balanced.

“The main task of the interim government will be to guarantee fair elections. However, this does not mean that it will stop working in other areas. The European way of Bulgaria will be followed,” Glavchev said.

Radev said that after consultations with the parliamentary groups, Glavchev would have until the evening of April 8 to make changes to the line-up.

Radev said that he intends to issue on April 9 the decrees appointing the caretaker government and for early parliamentary elections and European Parliament elections simultaneously – “two-in-one” on June 9.

Representatives of parliamentary groups attended Glavchev’s presentation, with the exception of the Bulgarian Socialist Party which said that it objected to the amended constitution, drawing criticism from Radev that it was showing a lack of political responsibility.

At the consultations – mandated by the amended constitution to take place after the nominees for a caretaker government are presented – the first reaction came from We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria, which registered strong objections to the proposals for the Interior, E-government and Justice ministers.

WCC-DB has long wanted Interior Minister Stoyanov out of the Denkov Cabinet, and at the consultations, WCC-DB co-leader Kiril Petkov said: “For us, the choice of Kalin Stoyanov is not only provocative, it is an insult”.

“A caretaker government has the highest goal that it must achieve, which is impartial elections, where the bought vote is limited to the maximum and that is the most important thing,” Petkov said.

Petkov said that the two ministers on whom independent elections would depend – Interior and E-government – “are entirely the responsibility of GERB with the great danger that we will once again only have a paper ballot and no electronic voting and the bought vote on the same scale that we saw in the local elections”.

He also objected to the nomination of Pavlova, a deputy of acting Prosecutor-General Borislav Sarafov, for the justice portfolio, and said that he had spoken on Thursday night to Gvozdeykov and had warned him that if he accepted the post in the caretaker government, he would be expelled from WCC-DB.

After Petkov spoke, he and the rest of the WCC-DB parliamentary group representatives – Hristo Ivanov and Atanas Atanassov – walked out of the consultations.

GERB-UDF’s Tomislav Donchev said that he would not comment on the line-up and would reserve doing so until the caretaker government’s term in office ends.

Yordan Tsonev of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms said that the MRF would respect Glavchev’s choice of the caretaker government.

Vuzrazhdane leader Kostadin Kostadinov said in ironic tones that the line-up was “well-balanced” between GERB-UDF, WCC-DB and the MRF.

Representatives of ITN also spoke.

(Screenshot of Glavchev and Radev via BNT)

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