“We want real changes“, said the people from the square. Then Prime Minister Rumen Radev seemed to ride the wave of the protests. During his meeting with him today, DARA seemed like a representative of the more authentic protesters, commented journalist Veselin Stoynev in the program “Face to Face“ on bTV.
Today at the Council of Ministers, DARA met with Radev after Bulgaria's uncontested victory at “Eurovision“ with the song Bangaranga.
“I expected DARA to have some political position, because after all, she is not in the square to sing, and she already has a strong public role. In it, many people recognized an image that would take Bulgaria forward. Regardless of how, regardless of whether there was criticism of it about whether the song was good or not. Its success is undeniable and it seems that we need something that will take us forward and bring us a little joy“, commented journalist Ruza Raycheva.
Stoynev said that DARA's statement was a surprise to him because it sounded like pressure. “DARA is undoubtedly an extremely smart and reactive person. She turned this pompous welcome into something very lively and real“.
“We see an awful lot of requests from “Progressive Bulgaria“ to fulfill the many promises, as it should happen. We have the removal of Borisov and Peevski's security, which is being emphasized a lot. For me, what happened with the planes was more telling and the fact that for the first time in a long time there is reciprocity in foreign policy. An example of this is visas“, explained Raycheva.
In her words, Bulgaria is now in a position to demand, not just give and agree to everything. “We have been in the European Union for 20 years as truly full members. We have been in NATO for almost 30 years. Our self-esteem is higher. And we want this to be manifested by the authorities through demands“.
“This with the visas was a very good political PR move, because it actually hid another problem - that Rumen Radev's voters do not like these planes to be parked at the Sofia airport, but they will stay there. Their term expires on May 31 and a new request for this is expected“, Stoynev commented.
He recalled that Marco Rubio and Mark Rutte have officially stated that these planes are not used for joint NATO operations. “And now Prime Minister Radev, and then the Minister of Defense, announced the news in this way: “Yes, in fact they will continue to stay if the US requests, but we will request that visas for Bulgarians be dropped“. Whether Radev's voters want to go to the US is another question“.
“I wonder what will happen if we don't get an answer. Will it then suddenly turn out that these planes are dangerous“, he asked.
Raicheva shared that she saw a sincere desire to work well in the changes to the parliamentary rules. “We have a concession on the most important thing that was set as a problem in this project - that the MPs should not receive information from the institutions. They gave up on that“.
“If we are critical, we cannot believe in sincerity. But there were concessions and audibility during this debate. They really heard what the opposition was saying. The question is that these ministers who are now in Radev's cabinet should be truly accountable and honest with respect to the procedure that exists and comply with it. They pointed out that it has not been complied with so far and that is why they are canceling it, which I do not know if it is a strong enough argument. Transparency is needed“, she added.
According to Stoynev, the society did not hear good arguments for many of the changes that were proposed by “Progressive Bulgaria“ in the regulations. “I also think that we can assume with good intentions that, out of fear of being pressed for time, they are trying to save it. Wasting time eats away at their credit of trust, which every ruler begins to lose at some point“.
“At the same time, however, this approach with drastic restrictions in the rules seems inexpedient to me, because they have an absolute majority. There is no need for such a change in the rules. On the contrary - they risked consolidating the otherwise fragmented opposition in a procedural way, so that it could participate“, he believes.