Bulgaria's Govt Warns of 'Plot to Discredit PM'

Politics » DOMESTIC | February 6, 2016, Saturday // 11:53
Bulgaria: Bulgaria's Govt Warns of 'Plot to Discredit PM' Bulgaria's Prime Minister Boyko Borisov. File photo, BGNES

The head of the Bulgarian government's press office has warned that yet another plot has been carried out, aimed at tarnishing the Prime Minister's reputation, during the latter's visit to London on Wednesday and Thursday.

In her second such comment for the past few weeks, Sevdelina Arnaudova is referring to a Q&A session with Prime Minister Boyko Borisov as he was meeting members of the Bulgarian community in the British capital.

A number of awkward questions were asked during the session, heightening tensions in the hall.

One of the expats attending broached the issue of a Der Spiegel article which argues that Bulgaria MP Delyan Peevski is part of the "iceberg of corruption" in the country. Recalling that "Spiegel" means "mirror" in German, he asked Borisov whether he saw Peevski when he looked in the mirror, prompting the PM to retort by enumerating the government's successes in boosting tax and excise revenues and in combating smuggling and organized crime.

A woman earlier wished to know why Sofia had abandoned the South Stream pipeline (suspended by Russia), but he interrupted her and asked her to stop reading from a sheet of paper, the same way he always replied without reading.

Most of the session, largely important to domestic media for much mas emigration to Western Europe has been a major issue, wasn't aired by leading Bulgarian TV station, sparking social media anger about "censorship".

A number of news websites, however, uploaded or offered links to footage of the entire session.

But Arnaudova argued in a Facebook comment [BG] that a plot organized to discredit Borisov had taken place during the meeting, with the controversial questions having been asked - in her words - by activists and members of the opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and ultra-nationalist Ataka party.

She opined it had been the head of the BSP's London-based structure (the bigger Bulgarian parties have such structures in London due to the relatively large Bulgarian community living and working in the UK) and an activist with Ataka who directed the questions to the Prime Minister.

There was no immediate comment from either Ataka or the BSP.

"I understand it suits you to portray a foolish act in a way you are being pushed to by your owners, but before writing about "awkward and tough questions" of "the entire Bulgarian community" in London, it is good to check at least who these people are and what actually happened at the embassy," Arnaudova wrote in an apparent address to journalists.

She added methods formerly used by Bulgaria's Communist-era security agency called State Security (DS), were being used even by younger politicians "denying" that the atrocities of the Communist regime.

At the end of January, Arnaudova argued in an interview with public broadcaster BNT that a scenario was being played out to topple down the government.

Borisov's second government took over under the slogan of "stability", vowing to fix all the mistakes made in governance by the previous administrations.

This comes nearly three years after his first cabinet resigned, amid mass street protests over costs of living an in particular electricity prices.

Ever since Borisov and his supporters have maintained the events of mid-February, 2013 were a result of a scenario to make the government step down.   

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Tags: Boyko Borisov, London, Sevdelina Arnaudova, plot, BSP, Ataka

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