Center-right seen as leading Bulgarian polls

Concerns mount over deadlock amid global crisis

A man is seen near pre-election posters for the controversial Bulgarian businessman and candidate Plamen Galev in the town of Dupnitsa, south of the capital Sofia, yesterday.

SOFIA (AFP) – Bulgaria’s center-right opposition looked set to defeat the ruling Socialists in a vote yesterday but unlikely to get a clear majority, sparking fears of political deadlock amid deepening economic crisis.

Nearly 44 percent of the 6.8-million electorate had voted by the afternoon, the central electoral commission said, as allegations of vote-buying emerged in the European Union’s most corruption-prone member.

Three clandestine exit polls showed the upstart center-right Citizens for the European Development of Bulgaria (GERB) party of maverick Sofia Mayor Boyko Borisov garnering 36 to 38 percent of the ballot. They were followed by the Socialists of outgoing Prime Minister Sergei Stanishev with 18 to 21 percent of the vote.

No outright majority and a highly fragmented parliament, with as many as eight parties expected to pass the 4-percent-entry threshold, spell trouble for both GERB and the Socialists in finding allies to form a stable government.

With coalition talks likely to take up the next months – and possibly even lead to repeat elections – observers were concerned about a political impasse at a time when the economic crisis is expected to peak in Bulgaria.

Both Borisov and Stanishev have so far kept mum on any plans for the future cabinet but President Georgi Parvanov urged them on Saturday to agree on a grand right-left coalition for the sake of Bulgaria’s stability.

“The best option for Bulgaria is an agreement between the first two (political) groups to form a government,” Parvanov said.

But some disagreed.

“The leading force in any future coalition should be GERB and they should not ally with the Socialists or the nationalist Ataka party in any case,” Ivan Ruzhev, a 39-year-old auto mechanic, told AFP as he waited outside a polling station in Sofia with his baby daughter. “I hope for an outright majority, as it will be difficult for GERB to find a good enough partner to govern. But this is unlikely to happen,” he added.

The new government will have to do more to combat corruption if it wants to clean up Sofia’s image as the most corruption-ridden member of the European Union and restore millions of euros of European aid that was frozen last year.

Corruption and vote-buying allegations marred the election, despite a huge awareness campaign and the introduction of heavy fines and jail terms for people found guilty of accepting or offering bribes for votes.

The Interior Ministry announced that it had received more than 100 reports of vote-buying attempts and launched investigations into 15 of the more serious cases, adding that at least three men had been arrested.

Media reports said people, especially in poverty-stricken Roma areas, were promised jobs and offered money, chickens, flour, oil, rice and even drugs to vote.

Yesterday, people with both Bulgarian and Turkish nationality in Turkey voted in 123 polling stations set up across 12 cities and towns, Turkey’s Anatolia news agency reported. About 120,000 such people are eligible to vote.

DUPNITSA, Bulgaria (Reuters) – The impoverished population of this sleepy Bulgarian town faced a bizarre choice of candidates in yesterday’s general election – suspected local crime bosses who are also town benefactors.

Exploiting loopholes in the European Union newcomer’s laws, two suspected crime chiefs awaiting trial registered last month to run for parliament in order to obtain release from custody as well as get temporary immunity from prosecution.

The participation of Plamen Galev and Angel Hristov, who have become symbols of the climate of impunity in Bulgaria, have shocked many in the Balkan country of 7.6 million, and in the European Union.

Diplomats say it was further proof that Sofia was not doing enough to clean up its act and crack down on powerful organized crime and chronic corruption.

But for people in Dupnitsa, at the foot of Rila Mountain some 60 kilometers (40 miles) south of Sofia, jobs and prosperity depend on the two former policemen known as the Galevi brothers. If elected to parliament, their immunity will become permanent.

“I’m not bothered that they have been to prison, because there are many others who should be in jail but are not,” said former teacher Stefka Popova, 62. “I trust them. They have money; they work for the satisfaction of doing something about the town.”

“Isn’t it a greater moral crime to be in power for four to five years and do nothing?” she said, referring to widespread popular anger with the ruling Socialist party for failing to boost living standards in the poorest EU nation.

The two burly former policemen, whose background and businesses are shrouded in mystery, were arrested in January on charges of racketeering and running an organized crime group.

According to local council officials, the two business partners have effectively run Dupnitsa for years through contacts in the police, courts and tax authorities. They are said to be members of an advisory council to the town’s mayor.

People said they were grateful to Galev and Hristov for renovating Dupnitsa’s park and several schools as well as laying fresh asphalt on potholed streets.

“It is obvious – they did something for the town. People care when somebody does something,” remarked a 24-year-old hairdresser who gave his name as Kamen.