24 Chasa Daily

"24 Chassa" carries an analysis entitled "Expert Government or Political Board",  prompted by increasingly frequent talk of expert government in Bulgaria. The author believes that such a government is sure to fail because, among other things, there is no way to have "an honest non-partisan expert" in a nation in which the government depends on the parliamentary majority.

The author suggests instead what he calls "a semi-presidential regime". "In the Bulgarian form of government we have the basics of this: the head of state is elected directly and has symbolic functions. It means that we need no revolution to make him personally propose to parliament a prime minister instead of give one parliamentary group a mandate to name a prime minister," the story goes. 

A story in "24 Chasa" quotes Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev as saying on Sunday that the prosecuting magistracy should look into the garbage crisis in Sofia for possible corruption and partisan interests ("Prosecutors to Probe Sofia's Garbage Contracts for Corruption").  The Prime Minister reportedly said that "many questions arise about the overall manner of household waste collection management". "There are a lot of untransparent things which give rise to suspicions of the existence of interests, including partisan interests, and corruption interests, and the prosecuting magistracy should look into this," he is quoted as telling reporters.

In "24 Chasa", European Affairs Minister Gergana Passy dwells on the a contemplated campaign whereby all transactions in real estates for more than 500,000 leva will be checked by the competent authorities. It is a measure from an action plan the government has adopted in the area of justice and home affairs and is meant to answer repeated criticism in the European Commission reports for what they call "inexplicable wealth". The initiative for the checks came from the prosecuting magistracy. No politician who finds himself among "the inexlicable wealthy" would get preferential treatment, Passy says. She adds that the campaign is not meant against the rich: it is something of an act of support for businesses who make money in a lawful way and  pay their taxes. 

Trud Daily

A story in "Trud" ("Another Vote Likely in Autumn") quotes Prof. Ognyan Gerdjikov MP (National Movement for Surge and Stability, NMSS) as saying that in a much feasible scenario the elections this summer will not result in the formation of a new government and then Bulgarians will have to go to the polling stations three times: for national parliament and for European Parliament in the summer, and again for national parliament in  the autumn. In the professor's words, that would be a serious shock and the beginning of a political crisis which would be too bad on the backdrop of the financial and economic downturn.

"Trud" reports that the Sofia chapter of the Right-wing Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) has nominated the party leader, Ivan Kostiv, for MP ("DSB Nominates Ivan Kostov in Sofia"). The nomination was announced by the leader of DSB's Sofia chapter Atanas Atanassov. A nomination campaign will run in DSB until March 26 and after April 5 the party will vote on the arrangement of the candidates in the election ticket, the story says. 

"Kostov Torpedoes the [Right] Alliance" heads a commentary in "Trud". The author says that a painful Right-wing alliance "is about to blow itself up before ever taking place". "Last week the Sofia chapter of the Right-wing Union of Democratic Forces (UDF) said they dont want Kostov in the election ticket. It would have been normal for the DSB leader to come up and say, Look, you are wrong because Å. Instead, his people yesterday nominated him as leader of the Sofia ticket." The author calls this a strong-arm move on the part of Kostov and an act of refusing to heed the partners.

"Trud" carries a rating of the Top Ten of Bulgaria's most influential women. The rating is based on a survey by the Mediana agency done on the paper's request. The unchallenged leader is EU Consumer Protection Commissioner Meglena Kouneva - the first Bulgarian European Commissioner, who gets an approval rating of 50 per cent. Deputy Prime Minister Meglena Plougchieva is runner-up with 29.7 per cent, followed by Labour and Social Policy Minister Emilia Maslarova with 27.3 per cent. Pop diva Lili Ivanova is the only representative of the entertainment industry in the politics-dominated Top Ten.

Standart Daily

"The majoritarian vote is opium of the masses," social analyst Kolyo Kolev says in "Standard News". He believes that majoritarian voting is "a very dangerous attempt to deceive people that they are voting for personalities and not for parties". Kolev doubts strongly that a political process based on voting for personalities is any better than voting for parties: "with parties, it is clear who gets the political esponsibility".

Kolev also suggests that the timing of elections be fixed - on the fourth week of September every four years, for example, and end all hassle on the matter. This last comment is clearly prompted by the controversy on the timing of the elections for national parliament and for European parliament this summer.

In "Standart", Sofia Mayor Boiko Borissov is quoted as saying that the Sofia waste crisis is "artificially ignited". "It is clear that political interests are involved here because municipal councilors of the Bulgarian Socialist Party [BSP] are striking on the waste issue," the mayor says. The municipal council is holding an extraordinary meeting on Monday to decide whether or not to terminate the concession of Novera.

Sega Daily

According to "Sega", the National Revenue Agency has finally taken up the case of estates associated with Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) leader Ahmed Dogan. It turns out that the said estates have been acquired at suspiciously low price and operate at a loss which does not seem to be a hurdle for them to obtain huge credits from certain banks. Two of the owners of the said estates are suspected of VAT fraud and one of them is even wanted by the prosecuting authorities. Most of the buildings are either owned or are being remodelled by a circle of companies connected with the former president of Multigroup, Nikolai Vulkanov. Vulkanov makes no secret of his close relations with Dogan and his companies are among MRF's biggest donors. "In any normal country, the above facts would be sufficient for a politician to withdraw from public life," the story comments. 

Klassa Daily

"Klassa" reports that credits from non-bank institutions have increased by 38.4 per cent on year, according to central bank figures. As at the end of 2008, companies offering what is called quick loans had provided a total of 2,817 million leva (4.3 per cent of the GDP) which was 782.1 million more than a year before. Those were dominated by loans to households (85.2 per cent) while loans to non-financial companies contracted to 14.4 per cent from 19.4 per cent.

In "Klassa", NMSS's deputy leader and former finance minister Milen Velchev says that a precautionary arrangement with the IMF will bring more benefits than harm. He believes that the currency board is without an alternative for Bulgaria at this stage. He adds, "We are aware that a number of companies suffer from having a fixed exchange rate when the national currencies of the countries around us are depreciating. But we dont see any other option for keeping up the macroeconomic stability, or one that would bring about faster accession to the euro-zone". 

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