Opposition BSP Tabled a Vote of No Confidence

The left-wing opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) submitted a vote of no confidence against the government on 17^th of January. The vote is based on the issue of failure to deal with corruption. GERB identified it as an attack on the stability of the governance.

BSP tabled the vote to the Nastional Asembly, but not in tandem with the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF). The reasons are the principle differences with the MRF on the motives of the vote, but not only that.

BSP do not approve the statement by the Honourable Chairperson of MRF, Ahmed Dogan, which he made before the Christmas holidays, saying there was no opposition political force prepared to take over the country's government.

BSP did not go into detail on the motives of the vote, but pointed out that they were attacking the failure to tackle corruption in various sectors such as healthcare, public procurement. It also became clear that the motives will also include the “dried sausage scandal“ (sudjukgate), as a well as the scandal with reason for the suicide scandal, as well as the scandal related to the alleged favouritism in appointments in Haskovo municipality. GERB (majority partner in the ruling coalition) said that this vote was pre-doomed to failure.

In the context of the no-confidence motion, BSP asked for declassification of innformation about the inspections by the State Agency for National Security SANS and the prosecutor's office in the revenue agencies. According to the left-wing opposition, this information contains data about a threat to the financial security and hence national security. They also requested that this information be examined in a closed sitting of the Parliament.

The Movement for Rights and Freedoms have already said they will back the vote of no confidence, albeit with different motives.

Even with the votes of BSP and MRF, however, this vote will not be able to overthrow the government.

It is expected that the discussion of the motion will take place next Wednesday, the Speaker of Parliament, Tsveta Karayancheva told BNT, and the voting most likely will be held on Friday morning.