Comment by Georgi Lozanov:
The authoritative philological website “How to spell“ with a poll that invariably arouses increased public interest, determined the Bulgarian word of the year for the fifth time. The word is “euro“, followed by “indignity“ - both of which together unmistakably point to the greatest success, the most dramatic problem and the most misleading manipulation of the political year 2025.
The adoption of the euro completed Bulgarian integration
The adoption of the euro is a national success of historical significance, because it marks the end of our long Western European integration – and since January 1st it has been in everyone's hands. This integration began after the Liberation (“I mapped out Bulgaria's path to Europe with Roman paving stones”, Stambolov would say, just before he was mercilessly murdered), was drastically interrupted by the Soviet regime and after its fall continued, but constantly encountered obstacles inspired by the East. The latest was the referendum invented in “12 to 5” by Rumen Radev, ostensibly not against the euro in principle, but in fact a very specific plan to refuse us from it. Those who voted for the word “euro” waved goodbye to the Eurosceptics.
The outrages of power
The political problem of 2025 is the same old one – the outrages in the exercise of power in our country, with the past year adding to them (especially with the arrest of the Varna mayor) the use of the state's repressive apparatus against the opposition. It smells of dictatorship when it is the government that is left to do whatever it wants, and that in itself is already a complete outrage.
The word “outrage“ came in second place in the ranking after the catchphrase of the leader of “We continue the change“ Assen Vassilev: “Who ordered this outrage“, which stimulates civil discontent, similar to Hristo Ivanov's action in “Rosenets“ in 2020. With it, Vassilev stopped the sudden withdrawal of the discussion in the Budget Committee earlier, so that the opposition would not miss it, and the citizens who had gathered to protest against the adoption of the budget in parliament would not understand what was going on inside.
The mass resistance caused by the government's draft annual budget was not so much because of one or another of its parameters, but because of the general feeling that a theft on the scale of Corpbank was at stake and that another billion would be imperceptibly stolen from taxpayers. However, they felt it, and that is why now “budget“ is among the first ten words indicative of the public agenda of 2025.
The government's manipulation and the protest
The manipulation of the year was the government's attempt to hide the problem behind success and make citizens come to terms with the outrages so as not to hinder the euro. The extent to which the manipulation succeeded is clear from the third word in the ranking - "protest". It - the biggest for the entire transition and with the potential to be activated by any subsequent outrage, was a convincing demonstration that it no longer works in the political market to offer one thing, but to sell something completely different. In this case - corruption, packaged in the eurozone. But Rumen Radev and his new party should also think about it, because the influence of the Kremlin, packaged as a fight against corruption, will not work just as well.
If Radev hopes that the citizens will swallow Putin because Trump cannot cope with him, or to deceive them with mantras for peace in Ukraine and for the independence of Bulgaria, tailored to the style of Russian propaganda, let him now see how far the ambitions of his colleague Kostadinov, who was trying to make it out that the protest was against the euro, have gone. Only media outlets that were ultra-loyal to Peevski - the protagonist of the square intolerance - picked up this "slander aria" from time to time, but they could not stop the euro, which became the talk of the year.
Radev's last speech with the old Eurosceptic mantras
President Radev's last speech, intended to connect the protest with his future party voters, was interesting only in one way - whether there would be a deviation from the Eurosceptic mantras. There was none. Radev even reminded of his ill-fated referendum against the euro, to make it clear that when he was asked "whose Crimea is" in the election campaign, the answer would still be the same - Russian. The protesters in 2020 did not pay much attention to this, because at that time it was assumed that the main problem of the state was its mafiaization, and Radev raised his fist against it.
But more than three years after Russia's invasion of Ukraine and 2 million deaths, his trick is unlikely to work again - the citizens in the squares today understand well that Bulgaria's problems are now two - mafiaization and the Russian threat. And if Peevski has become the embodiment of the first, Radev has all the prerequisites to displace Kostadinov and become the embodiment of the second. And the two, in symmetrical hatred, in addition to each other and towards the PP/DB, have real chances of interacting with GERB.
"When pa-"
The interaction of GERB with Peevski is an unshakable fact, and with Radev it is in perspective, as Boyko Borisov impatiently hinted, deciding to announce that he has more trust in him than in the PP/DB. But it would not be superfluous for the future party leader, who is set to climb political heights, to recall the song of the 2025 protest: “When pa-, when Peevski falls, I would not want to be below, so that he would not fall on me“. The short version of this song (when pa-) came in seventh place in the ranking for word of the year. Because what does it matter whether you fall from the high echelons of the deep or the Soviet power…