Bulgaria: WCC meets to decide approach to mandate to seek to form government
The national council of Bulgaria’s We Continue the Change (WCC) party was meeting on July 13 to decide how to proceed with the second of the mandates to seek to form a government.
Given the ructions within the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) that have relegated it from being Parliament’s second-largest party to its fourth-largest, the WCC-Democratic Bulgaria coalition’s group is now the second-largest, entitling it to be handed the next mandate to try to form a government.
President Roumen Radev said on July 12 that he would hand over this mandate “next week” and said that he wanted to hear from WCC-DB what they intended to do – to hold to their stance of remaining in opposition or whether they would try to get a government elected.
WCC-DB parliamentary leader and former prime minister Nikolai Denkov, speaking to reporters before Saturday’s meeting of the WCC national council, said: “This Parliament is like quicksand, a war in the MRF, the BSP [Bulgarian Socialist Party] is split, Velichie has disintegrated”.
Denkov said that what was going on in the MRF also would have a serious impact on Boiko Borissov’s GERB-UDF.
“We have repeatedly said that there are people [in GERB] closely related to [MRF national co-leader and parliamentary leader Delyan] Peevski, so the outcome of the war between Peevski and [MRF founder and honorary president] Dogan will have an impact on GERB,” Denkov said.
“All this makes the situation very unstable, it would be a complete illusion for someone to try to form a stable government”.
He said that WCC and Democratic Bulgaria had come up with a plan “that aims to achieve the maximum”. They would present this plan together in coming days, Denkov said.
WCC-DB previously has said that it would not form a ruling coalition with GERB-UDF, the MRF and pro-Kremlin party Vuzrazhdane.
WCC co-leader Assen Vassilev said: “”The mandate is a heavy responsibility, it must be very carefully discussed, but I don’t see any prerequisites in this Parliament for a pro-European anti-corruption government”.
WCC co-leader Kiril Petkov said: “We are continuing the talks with our coalition partners from DB and our councils”.
As matters stand, Borissov has said that no government would be elected, neither with the first (already abortive) mandate, nor the second or the third.
Of the split MRF group, the situation is unclear. National co-leader Dvezhdet Chakurov, this week ousted from the parliamentary group, has indicated a willingness for talks with WCC-DB on the second mandate.
Vuzrazhdane wants the third mandate, if matters come to that, while BSP acting leader Borislav Gutsanov has also indicated willingness for talks with WCC-DB. ITN continues to talk about an “expert” government with a specific programme and has said that it could talk to WCC-DB about that idea, if approached.
Of the now-defunct Velichie group, one faction favours backing a government proposed by WCC-DB while the other faction is against.
(Archive photo of Denkov: government.bg)
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