site.btaMedia Review: October 17

OVERVIEW

The Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) and all major TV channels report on Parliament's third consecutive day of failing to convene due to lack of quorum.

POLITICS

In an interview for Mediapool.bg entitled "Borissov is scared and confused. Early elections are possible but only next year", political analyst Assoc. Prof. Ivo Indzhov commented the current political situation in the country. Asked whether GERB leader Boyko Borissov and Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) - New Beginning Floor Leader Delyan Peevski work in tandem, the expert said: "For Borissov, Peevski is more of a burden than a desirable partner, and he [Borissov] is not happy that people increasingly associate him with [MRF Honorary President Ahmed] Dogan's heir. The existence of a government with Borissov as a shadow prime minister, at Peevski's 'mercy,' makes it inevitable that the two will be packaged together. In this vein, yes, Peevski and Borissov have already teamed up. How long this will continue is still too early to say. At the same time, it is more than clear that the two are like two sides of the same coin. They are symbols of a country conquered by political-oligarchic interests, where corruption and disregard for the rule of law continue to flourish."

According to Indzhov, Borissov's "outburst" from Tuesday was caused by GERB's disastrous performance in the municipal council elections in Pazardzhik, Southern Bulgaria, which saw the MRF - New Beginning come first and Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria (CC-DB) second. GERB finished sixth in the race compared to third in 2023. The expert said that while in absolute terms, GERB only lost 632 votes, this defeat was a significant loss for what is still the largest political force in Bulgaria.

He continued: "Moreover, Borissov is not at all comfortable with the current government configuration – he did not become prime minister for the fourth time, as was his dream, nor can he break away from the dependence of the government, whose mandate holder is GERB, [from the dependence of] Peevski's MRF - New Beginning. And the politician [Peevski], who has been sanctioned for corruption by the US and the UK, continues to suck up new power resources, even though he is not formally in the government."

Indzhov said that it is very likely that Parliament Chair Nataliya Kiselova will fall as the first victim to Borissov's anger. She was appointed to this post by the BSP - United Left. He added: "GERB's weak satellites in the government – the Socialists and Slavi Trifonov's TISP – may suffer the most damage from the situation that has arisen. Yesterday [on Tuesday], Borissov harshly criticized Kiselova, and Peevski made a clear statement about her removal. It seems that Borissov is least angry at himself and GERB."

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Former interior minister and CC-DB MP Boyko Rashkov, quoted by 24 Chasa, told reporters that there was brazen vote buying throughout the election day in Pazardzhik. He said that on election day, "Poor people were herded like animals to the polling stations by individuals whom we observed throughout the day." Rashkov accused the Interior Ministry representatives in Pazardzhik of looking the other way and concluded: "This is shocking and glaringly obvious." As a member of the parliamentary Committee for Control of the Security Services, he plans to ask the Interior Minister whether there are any pre-trial proceedings and investigations into vote buying and selling.

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CC-DB Co-Floor Leader Nadejda Iordanova said in an interview for the Bulgarian National Television that the elections in Pazardzhik, the way they were conducted and their results, magnified the picture that CC-DB painted with their vote of no confidence, namely that of state capture. The MP stated that power is not exercised in the interest of the people but by illegitimate centres. She slammed Borissov saying that "in his helplessness, he is helping Peevski's onslaught to completely seize power."

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Dobromir Zhivkov, Managing Director of the sociological agency Market Links, predicted in an interview for BNR that the position of Minister of the Interior will be filled by a member of the MRF - New Beginning. Zhivkov said: "We are familiar with Peevski's affinity for the security forces, and I think that will be the first [institution that he takes over]. Beyond that, it is difficult to say. The MRF - New Beginning must now join the government, not because Peevski lacks influence, but because it is time for him to take on the negatives. In this sense, Borissov was frank."

Zhivkov stated that Borissov, the leader of GERB, is aware of the major drawbacks and risks of joining the eurozone—the budget and inflation—and would rather not carry the responsibility for them entirely on his own. The expert believes that Peevski entering the government is not on the table for the time being, since it would scandalize the US and the EU due to the MP still being sanctioned under the US Magnitsky Act for corruption, using influence peddling and bribes.

JUSTICE

An article in Capital entitled "Crime with no Punishment: The Prosecution Service's Eyes Wide Shut" reads:

"Just two weeks ago, the prosecution service, the Association of the Prosecutors in Bulgaria, the Chamber of Investigators in Bulgaria reacted swiftly and hysterically with separate statements defending the status of acting Prosecutor General Borislav Sarafov. At the same time, the Anti-Corruption Fund released its investigation with an unprecedented account by prosecutor Ivaylo Zanev of how he was removed from the investigation of the large-scale corruption scandal Hemusgate shortly before filing an indictment, and then the case sank. The prosecution service and its affiliated bodies did not say a word about this revelation of machinations by senior prosecutors in a case involving the embezzlement of BGN 55 million, withdrawn in cash and carried out of the bank in bags. Obviously, this was not without political protection at the highest level. Not a word in response to media inquiries, not a peep about Prosecutor Zanev's interview with bTV this week, not a whimper.

"Dozens of cases involving crimes against justice and large-scale political corruption have been buried in the silence of the prosecution service and its unwillingness to see the obvious. The Deputy Mayor of Varna, Dian Ivanov, publicly announced that he had been pressured by inspectors from the Anti-Corruption Commission and personally by its head, Anton Slavchev, to give false testimony against Mayor Blagomir Kotsev. However, the prosecution service, which brought a case based on the testimony of a certain Plamenka [Dimitrova, the owner of a catering company, who accused Kotsev of demanding a bribe to greenlight a contract], see no crime here, even though this is not the first time Slavchev has been accused of pressuring witnesses (for reference: the case of a criminal group in the Customs Agency, which was launched loudly a year and a half ago and is now shrouded in silence). The strange thing is that in the case against Kotsev, one of the witnesses stated that he [the witness] had bribed one of the accused municipal councillors, i.e., he explicitly confessed to a crime, but no charges have been brought against him.

"The prosecution service is blind to vote trading in the elections in Pazardzhik, where it came to a 'citizen's arrest,' but the Ministry of Interior also announced that they had no evidence. What both the prosecution service and the Ministry of Interior are doing is called criminal inaction, causing enormous damage to democracy and society. They should probably give up their huge salaries, which come from our pockets."

ECONOMY

An analysis in 24 Chasa based on data from the National Social Security Institute suggests that some 360,000 pensioners out of a total of more than 2 million, or slightly less than 18%, have opted to work in 2024. This is a significant increase compared to that rate being 11% in 2019 and 7% a decade ago. The article explains:

"Few people remember, but just 10-15 years ago, businesses were fighting for the right to easily dismiss working pensioners. At that time, 'working pensioner' was almost a dirty term, and politicians and businesses explained that the large number of working pensioners was preventing young people from finding jobs. In the more distant past, about 20-25 years ago, people over the age of 55 could not find work at all. With high unemployment at the time, businesses preferred to hire young people and did not consider older people at all.

"Today, however, the situation has reversed completely. The number of people of working age is declining, unemployment is at a record low, and there is nowhere to find workers and employees. As a result, businesses are trying to retain people who have reached retirement age, especially since they have accumulated experience and routine. So, employers are being flexible and doing everything they can to retain their valuable staff."

The article concludes that the labour shortage also leads to pressure to increase wages. Improved pay and greater flexibility on the part of employers create more incentives for pensioners to remain in the labour market. It adds that Bulgaria has more working pensioners compared to Germany's 285,000. This is a problem for Europe's largest economy, as ageing leads to a decline in the working-age population, which hinders the economy.

Former caretaker minister of tourism Ilin Dimitrov shared that a major problem is the lack of personnel, which is an issue in all economic sectors but particularly pronounced in the tourism industry. He stated: "The shortage of personnel is chronic and will only get worse. A simple calculation shows that for every 100 people leaving the labour market, there are only 65 replacements. Given this unfavourable ratio and the growth of the hotel base by between 10 and 20 large resort complexes per year, I see no other solution than an aggressive state policy to attract personnel to the sector."

TOURISM

An article by BNR is dedicated to the upcoming tourist winter season. It cites data from the Ministry of Tourism, according to which between January 1 and October 1, 2025, 1,359,000 Bulgarians and 632,000 foreigners have visited tourist destinations across the country. Prof. Rumen Draganov, head of the Institute of Analysis and Assessment in Tourism, said that he expects a continuation of last year's levels with a slight increase of 2 to 3%. He added: "We are sticking to last year's figures because what we are seeing in the summer of 2025 is that tourism is becoming increasingly sustainable, i.e., we are seeing how the spikes from 2022-2023, after the pandemic, are already decreasing and turning from double digits to single digits. And the current situation in Europe is making us even more cautious in our assessments."

So far, winter resorts are 25% full, considering that the ski season usually starts in mid-December. Over 2.2 million tourists are expected to visit Bulgaria this winter, with only one out of six visits being related to ski tourism. Bulgarian tourists remain the most important link in the sector, as for every foreigner there are four Bulgarians using tourist services in Bulgaria. Most foreigners come from the country's neighbours as well as from the European Union.

EDUCATION AND INTELLIGENCE

Capital has published an op-ed entitled "Restricting Social Media for Children Is a Good Idea", which suggests that while restrictions on the surface tend to sound like a bad idea, especially when they limit the access to modern technologies, they can be good. The text reads:

"Technology and progress, on the other hand, intuitively sound like a good thing. That is why the proposal by the Minister of Education, Krasimir Valchev, to ban social media for children under the age of 15 in Bulgaria intuitively sounds like a bad idea. But it is not. Bulgaria should introduce a ban on the use of social media by children, as well as a ban on the use of phones and devices with screens in school, unless they are necessary for the lesson itself.

"For over 20 years, Silicon Valley tech companies have been paying the highest salaries in the world to engineers whose sole purpose is to get consumers to spend more time in front of a screen. This process was accelerated by the replacement of old phones with smartphones and, consequently, the ability to carry the entire internet in your pocket. The result today is clear: a huge part of the world's population is addicted to screens. The waking hours during which people are not looking at a phone, tablet, laptop, or TV are reduced to minutes.

"Internet and screen addiction has negative consequences for people of all ages—the human brain is simply not designed to take in so much information, nor to be bombarded with dopamine rush after dopamine rush every day. Social media is full of both. They overload the brain with new information, but at the same time constantly prompt users to open them again and again in the hope of receiving a notification that will give them a dopamine rush.

"However, no one suffers more than the youngest. Unlike older users, many of whom grew up without the internet and whose brains developed in the same way as those of all people throughout human history, for over 20 years now, children have been growing up without knowing life without the internet, and many of them without [knowing life without] a smartphone.

"The effects are visible. Since 2015, scientists in the fields of psychology and neurology have conducted numerous studies on the effects of social media and screen addiction on young people. In 2023 four researchers from universities in Shanghai and Hong Kong published a paper summarising the results of 28 studies conducted between 2015 and 2023, specifically on the brains of children between the ages of 0 and 18 suffering from digital addiction. The synthesized results contain evidence of harmful effects on the structure and functionality of the brains of children and adolescents, as well as damage to the prefrontal region of the brain, visible in all studies."

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In an interview for 24 Chasa, national psychologist for Mensa Bulgaria and psychodiagnostician Daniela Lecheva reports that boys under 14 tend to do better at IQ tests compared to girls their age. Girls and women over 14 on the other hand have a higher successful rate compared to their male peers. Lecheva notes that people with exceptionally high logical-mathematical intelligence often have phenomenal memories but lower emotional intelligence. Conversely, those with lower intelligence are very aware of their emotions and are much more expressive. 

SPORTS

Mediapool.bg quotes weightlifter and world record holder Karlos Nasar, who shared in an interview that he will not sign a contract with the Bulgarian Weightlifting Federation, while it is chaired by Stefan Botev, who is associated with MRF - New Beginning Floor Leader Peevski. The athlete said: "There's no way they can tempt me. Although you can see what is happening with our federation. I hope they don't take away my right to be a weightlifter. So it goes. The situation in our federation is very, very difficult." Nasar pointed out that the federation's debts amount to BGN 1 million and stated that Botev lacks the desire, the vision and the ability to lead the organization. The athlete shared that he has not taken any money from the federation and relies entirely on private sponsorship. His manager reported that Qatar and Saudi Arabia both have offered Nasar USD 1.5 million to have him compete for them.