A month of continuous demonstrations against the Bulgarian
government has brought the Balkan state’s population alongside struggles in Egypt , Brazil
and Turkey
that are directly challenging political systems.
The Russian newspaper Pravda observed: “There are barely any local
products in stores, everything is imported. Meat comes from Germany , tomatoes from Turkey and Greece ,
garlic from China , potatoes
from the Czech Republic
The crisis is so bad that the country’s health system is on
the point of collapse because high numbers of medically-trained staff have quit
the country to work in other EU states.
Earlier this year, a mass movement brought down a right-wing
government. Now the target is the regime led by the country’s Socialist Party.
The party came out of the ruins of the Bulgarian Communist Party which had
presided over a Stalinist regime until the revolutions that swept Eastern Europe in 1991 led to its collapse.
Yesterday, the embattled government, which has assumed many
characteristics of the old regime, denied speculation that it was about to
resign. The foreign minister went on TV to urge protesters to “focus on a more
positive direction with specific requests for specific policies, not just calls
for resignation of the government."
This pathetic plea is certain to fall on deaf ears, however.
The mass of the population is impoverished, cannot afford energy prices and
sees the government of prime minister Plamen Oresharski as highly corrupt.
The current round of streets protests was triggered by the
decision to appoint media mogul Delyan Peevski as – wait for it – national
security chief. The government eventually abandoned the decision, but this only
emboldened the protests. Now the opposition nationalist and right-wing parties
are threatening to boycott parliament, a move that could force the resignation
of the government.
In the last week, demonstrators have once again poured
onto the streets of the capital Sofia ,
with the country’s “corrupt” political system in the firing line. They gathered
in front of the parliament chanting “mafia,” “resignation,” “go away with
peace.”
The demonstrators clashed with riot police on
several occasions as they decided to change tactics and blockade the parliament
building. Up to 10,000 people have been out on the streets every evening since
June 14.
At the last rally, Viktoria Katova, a 24-year-old protestor,
said: “Things can't get any worse. I'd rather go for 10 snap elections in a row
than put up with this corrupt, insolent political class that pretends it does
not notice us”.
Another 55-year-old protester, physical education teacher
Nikolay Staykov, said: “This isn't democracy. Bulgaria has been parcelled
out to different business circles... what we have here is a state mafia. All
the parties are the same... We must wipe all that out and build the political
system up from scratch.”
The situation has so disturbed the EU bureaucracy that the
French and German governments issued an unprecedented
joint statement and had it published in the country’s mass circulation
paper.
“It is clear that the Bulgarian public insists that the
political, administrative, judicial and economic elites subscribe to the
principles of public interest. It is obvious that the society fears the
penetration of private interests in the public sphere,” the statement said.
There was, they added, no room for the “oligarchic model” in the EU.
Yet it is this oligarchic-type of merging between state and
corporate interests that is now pretty universal, not just throughout the EU
but in most capitalist countries. This is one of the key factors behind a wave
of global struggles. Behind them are not only economic demands but aspirations
for political democracy. That’s what makes them revolutionary.
Paul Feldman
Communications editor
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