Bulgaria: Dogan’s MRF says it has expelled Peevski and his allies from the party
The central operational bureau of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) has decided to expel MRF co-leader and parliamentary leader Delyan Peevski and MPs loyal to Peevski from the MRF, according to a statement by that faction of the party that remains loyal to founder and honorary president Ahmed Dogan.
The August 27 statement is the latest episode in the faction fighting between Peevski and Dogan, who on July 10 called for Peevski to resign from his leadership posts.
Peevski scorned that call. Currently in Bulgaria’s Parliament, there is an official parliamentary group headed by Peevski, while a number of MPs elected on an MRF ticket sit as non-aligned MPs, having been expelled by Peevski.
According to the Dogan faction, Dogan held a meeting with the central operational bureau at which it was decided that Dogan loyalist Dzhevdet Chakurov would be at the helm of the MRF.
Among those named as having been expelled from the party was Iskra Mihailova, named earlier on August 27 by Peevski as the MRF’s choice of candidate European Commissioner, in response to a call by caretaker Prime Minister Dimitar Glavchev for parliamentary groups to propose candidates.
In addition to Peevski, also named as expelled from the MRF are MPs Yordan Tsonev, Khalil Letifov, Hamid Hamid, Stanislav Anastassov, Radoslav Revanski and Erten Anisova.
The announcement also listed 10 regional and district leaders of the MRF as having been expelled from the MRF.
Amid the conflict between Dogan and Peevski, there have been leadership meetings involving the pro-Dogan faction, with Peevski having rejected these meetings as illegitimate.
Peevski currently is subject to sanctions by the United States and United Kingdom for large-scale corruption. Dogan, the founder of the MRF which traditionally has an electorate based on Bulgarians of ethnic Turkish descent, years ago was named as having worked for Bulgaria’s communist-era secret service State Security.
The conflict between the two comes as Bulgaria heads to its latest early parliamentary elections, to be held on October 27, with it remaining unclear which faction will prevail in naming the legally recognised list of its election candidates.
The faction fighting comes amid the context of Peevski having advanced people loyal to him while marginalising those loyal to Dogan. It has had an impact at governmental level, when Glavchev dismissed district governors close to Dogan and replaced them with figures close to Peevski.
Bulgarian National Television reported Peevski as responding on the evening of August 27: “I saw that there was a gathering of MRF breakaways who were excluded from the parliamentary group, and after they tried to steal the MRF brand they lost their party capacity.
“This unconstitutional action shows people who live in the parallel world of barnyard fairy tales. These people must understand one thing – this is a European Bulgaria and everything happens according to the law,” Peevski was quoted as saying.
(Archive photos: Peevski, left, and Dogan, right)
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