First sitting of Bulgaria’s 51st National Assembly deadlocked over election of Speaker
The first sitting of Bulgaria’s 51st National Assembly, begun on November 11, was adjourned for the day after parliamentary groups failed to elect a Speaker.
Until a Speaker is elected, the Parliament elected on October 27 in Bulgaria’s latest early parliamentary elections cannot transact business.
The first sitting is to resume at 11am on November 13.
Boiko Borissov’s GERB-UDF coalition is insisting that Parliament resume the tradition of the Speaker coming from the largest parliamentary group – in this case, itself.
In the first round, the candidacies of Natalia Kiselova (Bulgarian Socialist Party – United Left), Nicoleta Kuzmanova (ITN), Petar Petrov (Vuzrazhdane), Raya Nazaryan (GERB-UDF) and Andrey Tsekov (We Continue the Change-Democratic Bulgaria) were voted on, but none of them managed to win a majority of the votes.
Nazaryan and Tsekov went to the second round. Both gathered only 68 votes in their support.
The votes for Nazaryan came solely from the GERB-UDF group. Borissov has made the key condition for attempting to form a government the election of a Speaker from his group.
ITN proposed that Silvi Kirilov, who in terms of the rules of procedure was presiding over the sitting as Parliament’s oldest member, be elected acting Speaker pending the formation of a majority. Kirilov is an ITN MP.
Outside Parliament, there were sundry protests, involving – among others – supporters of Delyan Peevski’s Movement for Rights and Freedoms – New Beginning coalition, supporters of Velichie – the populist-nationalist party that did not win seats on October 27 – and VMRO, the nationalist party that did not stand in the latest elections.
On November 11, Borissov said that he was envisaging a coalition government involving GERB-UDF, WCC-DB, ITN and the BSP – United Left, and insisted that such a government should be headed by himself as Prime Minister. WCC-DB and ITN have rejected the idea of Borissov returning as PM.
Meanwhile, the Constitutional Court said on November 11 that it had agreed to hear an application signed by 58 MPs from the 50th National Assembly to annul the results of elections in 52 voting stations. The application was lodged on the grounds of alleged irregularities. This is the second application to the court to overturn part of the October 27 election results.
(Photo, of members of the 51st National Assembly being sworn in on November 11: parliament.bg)
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