site.btaMRF–New Beginning Supports Budget Extension, Advocates Machine Ballot Counting

Bulgaria's President Rumen Radev met with representatives of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) – New Beginning on Tuesday as part of the second day of government-forming talks following the resignation of the Rosen Zhelyazkov Cabinet. Attending the consultations were Deputy Floor Leaders Jordan Tzonev, Halil Letifov and Iskra Mihaylova-Koparova, as well as MPs Aysel Mustafova and Dzhem Yamenov.

The head of State's discussions with parliamentary groups began on Monday with GERB-UDF and Continue the Change–Democratic Bulgaria. Earlier on Tuesday, Radev met with Vazrazhdane.

Opening the consultations with MRF–New Beginning, Radev said: "You are not part of the governing coalition, but you have always voiced your support and have propped up this government, taking a clear position that there should be no snap elections and that Bulgaria needs a stable government that will run its full term and deliver important policies for the country." He added that MRF–New Beginning was deeply involved in "these processes that are unfolding in the Bulgarian Parliament and in our society."

MRF - New Beginning Deputy Floor Leader Jordan Tzonev noted: "The events that have taken place clearly tell us that this Parliament has come to the end of its real political life." He recalled that his party supported this government with the clear understanding that the political crisis of the past four years needed to find a solution, especially in view of the important events facing the country, such as the introduction of the euro and the geopolitical situation. "We supported it for its policies. We did not participate in governance through positions - neither at the level of the executive branch nor in parliamentary committees - so that it would be clear that we support the government, not positions," Tzonev said.

Radev asked the MRF–New Beginning representatives whether they would seek to extend the life of the 51st National Assembly under a different governing configuration, or whether they believed snap elections were unavoidable. He also asked whether changes to the Election Code were needed and raised the issue of the budget extension law and how it would be implemented. 

Tzonev responded: "In our opinion, there should have been a regular budget, but in the current situation, as most political forces want an extension budget, we will support it." According to MRF-New Beginning, an extension budget does not provide an opportunity to protect large social groups. Tzonev recalled that January and February are the weakest months in terms of revenues, which will seriously complicate the budget situation.

As to machine voting, Tzonev said that ballots should be paper-based and machines should be used to count the votes. It became known that MRF-New Beginning supports machine voting, but not with the existing voting machines that they consider compromised. Radev agreed with MRF-New Beginning's argument that court proceedings should make it possible to establish whether there were discrepancies in the data. He also supported the proposal for a parallel count of what machines show. 

On price gouging and the euro changeover, the President said he supported all measures necessary to prevent unjustified price increases. He questioned why such measures had not been in place throughout the year so far. "In my view, this period should have begun in the first half of the year. The work that needed to be done was not done, so there would be no price gouging," he noted.