Volume 9 Numbers 1/2

Winter/Spring 2000

Constitutional Watch
     A country-by-country update on constitutional politics in Eastern Europe and the ex-USSR

Bulgaria - Bulgaria's political scene has been marked by substantial changes inthe cabinet. The first hints of a possible government reshuffle came on November 16, after the leadership of the Union of Democratic Forces (UDF) met and discussed, among other things, their party's lukewarm performance in October's local elections. (For more information on the election, see Bulgaria Update, EECR, Vol. 8, No. 4, Fall 1999.) Although UDF-the predominant party of the parlia-mentary majority-won the largest share of the vote (32 percent), support for the opposition was consider-able, and UDF received about one million fewer votes than it had in the 1997 parliamentary elections. During the campaign, each government minister had been responsible for campaigning in a few electoral districts. After the party's poor showing, Prime Minister Ivan Kostov (who also chairs UDF) proposed that those ministers who presided over districts where UDF lost should resign or be dismissed from the cabinet by December 10.

Kostov's surprising pronouncement was also spurred by accusations of corruption leveled against some government figures. Kostov asked both the media and the secret services for evidence to back these claims. Although ultimately he declared the evidence inconclusive, Kostov nonetheless forwarded it to the procurator general. The accusations appear to stem from suspect party financing over the last ten years. In any case, Kostov apparently preferred pushing for passage of a law on party financing rather than pressing for further investigation. (A bill on party financing, prepared by the parliamentary judicial committee, is currently in the legislature, having passed a first reading.) President Petar Stoyanov, however, asked for a response to the allegations; he gave a speech making clear his concern about corruption in the executive and requesting substantial cabinet changes.

A reshuffle was announced on December 20. Ten of sixteen ministers lost their posts: swept out were the ministers of defense, justice, interior, industry, trade, public administration, transport, regional and local development, health care, and education and science. The prime minister also took steps to streamline the government and to sharpen its focus on the sputtering economy (the unemployment rate has hovered around 18 percent in the first months of the year, and an esti-mated 40 percent of the population lives in poverty). Kostov further announced his intention to abolish the ministries of trade and state administration; henceforth the Ministry of Economics will hold a monopoly on all decision making related to the economy. In addition, the minister of economics will be the only cabinet member with the status of vice prime minister (previ-ously there had been three vice prime ministers). On December 22, parliament approved the new cabinet by a vote of 149 out of the 218 deputies present. The Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) voted against the new ministerial lineup, the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) supported it, and Euroleft abstained from voting, arguing that the prime minister did not provide an adequate explanation for the changes.

Indeed, Prime Minister Kostov said little about the dismissals, beyond emphasizing repeatedly that the cabinet had done a good job, and that the ten minis-ters were not replaced because of specific failures but because they had lost the confidence of the public. (It later appeared that the ministers had also been unpop-ular with the party's rank and file; at UDF's national conference, on February 26 and 27, all of them lost their leadership positions in the party.) Kostov only went into detail regarding two of the ministers. Apparently, Vice Prime Minister and Minister of Education Veselin Metodiev was dismissed at his own request, since he had proposed an amendment to the election law that envisaged the appointment (rather than election) of mayors in villages with up to 500 inhabitants-a measure much criticized during the local elections. Minister of Interior Bogomil Bonev was replaced because his governing style allegedly caused numerous conflicts between the ministry and the judiciary, and because of the lack of accountability and transparency within his ministry. Bonev, ironically, was the only minister who scored well in polls of public confidence.

Bulgaria.Some of the fired ministers bounced back quickly. Five returned to parliament as deputies. A day after his dismissal, former defense minister Georgi Ananiev was appointed presidential adviser on defense matters. The prime minister also announced that one of the most highly criticized cabinet members-Minister of Economics Alexander Bozhkov-would become the principal negotiator with EU institutions, thus playing a key role in preparing for Bulgaria's integration into the Union. Two former cabinet members declared they would go into the private sector-Minister of Transport Vilhelm Kraus and Minister of Health Petar Boyadzhiev.

After all the upheaval, it is unclear whether the new cabinet has done much to improve UDF's standing in the public eye. Opinion polls indicate that only 36 percent of the population has confidence in the new cabinet, and confidence in UDF is even lower. By contrast, public confidence in some if not all opposition figures is quite high: Sofia Mayor Stefan Sofianski has a 58 percent approval rating; on the other hand, BSP leader Georgi Parvanov and former president Zhelyn Zhelev polled only 24 percent. The cabinet shake-up did, however, seem to boost ratings for both the prime minister and the president: confidence in the president (68 percent) and the prime minister (45 percent) has increased more than 10 percent.

In any event, fallout from the local elections is not over. In the upcoming months, all the parties are preparing national congresses to discuss recent elec-tion results, given that they all fared poorly compared with previous elections. Discussion will probably center around coalition building, since it appears that none of the parties may now win a clear majority in the 2001 parliamentary elections.

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Recent months also witnessed a great deal of foreign policy activity, much of it centered around Bulgaria's aspirations to join both NATO and the EU. In a visit with symbolic importance-the first official visit ever by an American president-Clinton arrived in Sofia on November 22. Germany's Gerhard Schröder, the EU's Romano Prodi, and NATO's George Robertson visited as well. From January 22 to 23, the prime ministers of the seven states neighboring Yugoslavia (Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Macedonia, and Romania) met with the EU's top foreign policy representative, Javier Solana. Relations with Kosovo were highlighted, too: Prime Minister Kostov met with Albanian Kosovar leaders Hashim Thaci and Arben Dzhaferi.

In an important milestone, on December 10, Bulgaria, along with five other countries, was invited officially to begin negotiations on full EU membership. To expedite accession, a new parliamentary committee-the Council on European Issues-was established in February. The committee's working mode differs substantially from that of other parliamentary committees. All decisions will be based on consensus, and all parliamentary parties will have an equal number of deputies-three-on the committee (representation in other committees is proportional to the number of parliamentary seats a party holds). In addition, the prin-cipal negotiator, Alexander Bozhkov, will be held directly accountable to parliament and the committee, and an easier and faster amendment procedure is envis-aged for bills aimed at harmonizing Bulgarian laws with European requirements (approximately 800 bills need to be passed to comply with the massive acquis commu-nautaire). The parliamentary speaker, Iordan Sokolov, was elected chairman of the committee.

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On October 19, the Constitutional Court again consid-ered issues surrounding the appointment and mandates of Supreme Judicial Council members. (The council is an independent body for the judiciary's self-governance and is composed of representatives of the three classes of judicial officers: judges, procurators, and police investiga-tors). The controversy had arisen originally in February 1999, when, in accordance with amendments to the Law on the Judiciary, half of the council members were to be replaced by new members. The investigators, however, reelected their two representatives on the council: the director of the National Investigative Service, Boyko Rashkov, and department head Angel Aleksandrov. In July 1999, the UDF appealed to the Constitutional Court, asking for an interpretation of Art. 130.4 of the Constitution, which states that "elected members of the Supreme Judicial Council shall serve terms of five years. They shall not be eligible for immediate reelection." This would seem to apply to Rashkov and Aleksandrov. (Note that the UDF and Rashkov had tense relations. In fact, then-interior minister Bogomil Bonev, who alleged that he had evidence implicating Rashkov in various crimes, had asked the Supreme Judicial Council to dismiss Rashkov, but the council deemed the evidence insuffi-cient and declined. (See Bulgaria Update, EECR, Vol. 8, Nos. 1/2, Winter/Spring 1999.)

Finally, in October, the Constitutional Court settled the matter. It issued an advisory opinion to the effect that the reelection of council members was unconstitutional, regardless of the duration of their term or the reason for its termination. Bowing to the Court's interpretation of the law, the Supreme Judicial Council requested the two investigators to resign. Both refused. The council then annulled their elections. Rashkov subsequently appealed to the Supreme Administrative Court, but the Court upheld the coun-cil's decision, and Rashkov and Aleksandrov were forced out. Two new members were elected shortly thereafter, on December 17.

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