Elections 2009 - Parties

BND (Bulgarian New Democracy)

HISTORY

The Bulgarian New Democracy (BND) party was founded in May 2008 by MPs who split from the National Movement for Stability and Progress (NMSP) party of former Tsar and former Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg.

17 NMSP members left the party after a six-month long conflict, which began during the June 2007 Congress when the NMSP split in two fractions. One of them around Milen Velchev (known as "the yuppies" prevailed over the other one around Plamen Panayotov (the so-called "lawyers' lobby"). The "lawyers" accused the group around Velchev of manipulating the intra-party elections.

4 MPs from the lawyers' group were expelled from NMSP, and the other 13 left on their own.

In December 2007, 14 of those MPs formed the Bulgarian New Democracy Parliamentary Group, which became the eighth group in the 40th Bulgarian Parliament. Three other MPs joined later.

After leaving the 52-member NMSP parliamentary group, the 17 BND MPs practically formed the largest opposition fraction in the 40th Bulgarian Parliament. The BND MPs stated they were against the governing three-way coalition with the Bulgarian Socialist party, and against Saxe-Coburg surrounding himself with obedient servants, who voted by orders, leading the NMSP towards extinction.

The BND declared itself a center-right party, and voted on the side of the rightist opposition in the last three no-confidence vote against the three-way coalition government.

After the two major right-wing opposition parties - the Union of Democratic Forces (UDF) and the Democrats for Strong Bulgaria (DSB) formed an election coalition in March 2009, the BND asked to join them. The UDF leader, Martin Dimitrov, said that there was no room for former royalists and the offer was rejected on the base that the BND was only recently part of the ruling coalition.

In the beginning of April, BND representatives began coalition negotiations with the newly founded Movement "Forward" but eventually they registered with the Central Election Commission (CEC) to run solo at the European Parliament (EP) elections. BND believes they will win at least one EP seat.

The party leader is Bulgaria's Former Defense Minister, Nikolay Svinarov. Borislav Ralchev is the Chair of the BND parliamentary group.

IDEOLOGY

The BDN defines itself as a center-right political party. The BND states one of its main goals was to become a party of the regions which will work towards eliminating the existing disparity between different areas of the country in the quality of living. BND has initiated several legislative measures such as the establishment of a public retirement fund, administrative control over business activities, additional protection of competition, health care, privatization and post-privatization control.

ELECTORAL PERFORMANCE

The BND has not taken part in elections so far.

INTERNATIONAL POLITICAL AFFILIATION

None