The Tour in Shoumen
The weekend of August 27th through the 29th, we were in Shoumen where we held the first services of our www.bibliata.com National Tour 2005 in the local Pentecostal church. We began with a revival service on Friday night followed by four teaching modules on Saturday afternoon which included: (1) an informative introduction of the website, (2) a lecture on paleography, (3) an overview of the history of the Bulgarian Bible and (4) a discussion on the modern revisions of the Bulgarian Bible. The Saturday services targeted the youth and Sunday morning we concluded with the whole congregation ministering from Hebrews chapter 13. The message appeared to be a timely one as everyone came to the alters and many people at the end of the service testified of how the Lord had not left them in the darkest of times.
Bulgaria’s New Cabinet
The new executive power in Bulgaria will be inaugurated at a special ceremony on Wednesday morning at the Council of Ministers. The former Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg and his ministers are to “hand down” the power to the new cabinet headed by the new PM Sergey Stanishev. Later in the day each former minister will inaugurate his new successor into the work at the ministries.
The government formed by Bulgaria’s socialists, centrists and ethnic Turks was installed Tuesday. Socialist Party leader Sergey Stanishev, 39, claimed the post of Prime Minister, almost two months after the general elections and one failed attempt to form a government. His nomination was backed by 168 of the 235 lawmakers who voted; 67 opposed Stanishev’s candidacy. Parliament members okayed the structure of the new Cabinet with a 169-67 vote, a total of 236 MPs participated.
The line-up of the Cabinet was approved by 169 lawmakers, while 68 opposed it. The ministerial seats in the cabinet are distributed 8:5:3 among the Bulgarian Socialist Party, the centrist Simeon II National Movement and the predominantly ethnic Turkish Movement for Rights and Freedoms respectively. The new ministers swore in minutes after the vote.
Torrential Rains Hit Bulgaria
Three Bulgarian towns have declared emergency situations over the torrential rains that hit the country over the last 24 hours. The municipalities of Ihtiman, Kostenets and Gorna Malina are still fighting with the nature disaster. More than 1,500 people in Ihtiman have been evacuated because of the rain. The people have been gathered at the local schools and they are being supplied with food and beverages, mayor Margarita Petkova announced. The water in the streets reached 1,80 meters. Two of the nearby dams have been destroyed. Six people with minor injuries have been taken to the Ihtiman hospital. The damages caused by the floods that hit Bulgaria over the last two months are worth EUR 150 M, EU experts announced. About 3,200 people live in the regions, which were hit by heavy rainfalls from May 25th till July 20th this year. The number of the people directly affected by the natural disasters totals 2 million. According to data of the Finance Ministry as of July 25, registered damages amount to BGN 250 M.
Is There Revival in Bulgaria?
This question has been asked time and time again in the past 15 years since the fall of the Berlin wall. However, revival in Bulgaria is not a post-communist element alone. Regardless of the severe persecution of the Communist Regime, the underground church was in a state of nationwide revival and unstoppable growth. Through the testimony and the endurance of the saints, thousands were saved and sanctified. In the larger Pentecostal wing of the underground church, almost 100% were baptized in the Holy Spirit. Although the ruling atheism had proclaimed the death of the church and the communist regime had denied its existence, the Protestant church in Bulgaria was very much alive. Read more
Bulgaria’s Socialists Fail Again
Bulgaria’s Socialist Party and its coalition partner Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) officially admitted failure to form a minority government. With the return of the exploratory mandate to the President, they practically cleared the way for the King’s party and the right-wing to receive the mandate next.
Socialist leader Sergey Stanishev, 39, announced the decision around noon on Thursday, after last night’s bid to earn support for the draft Cabinet triggered a Parliamentary crisis. “We do not want to rule at all costs,” said Stanishev, 39, who will remain at the helm of the Socialist party after his government’s vote debacle. He lashed his political opponents for being irresponsible about Bulgaria’s national interests, adding that it would be impossible to form any government without the Socialists and the MRF represented in it.
Former Premier Ivan Kostov (Democrats for Strong Bulgaria), Nadezhda Mihaylova (Union of Democratic Forces), Krassimir Karakachanov (Bulgarian National Union) and Anelia Mingova (head of parliamentary group of King’s party) met President Parvanov later on Thursday. The opposition parties have not nominated anyone for Prime Minister yet. The President confirmed his readiness to hand “as soon as tomorrow” the mandate to the June 25 elections runner up Simeon II National Movement.
Stanishev, 39, had an unprecedented Premiership that lasted for little more than five hours. In a controversy-marked extraordinary session that continued until the small hours of Thursday, lawmakers turned down the Socialist draft after approving Sergey Stanishev for Prime Minister (120/119. “Yesterday in Parliament we witnessed unprecedented pressure on lawmakers,” Stanishev said in his statement Thursday.
On Tuesday the Cabinet vote was blocked after all opposition MPs staged a walkout of parliament in an unprecedented voting debacle. The Socialist Party led election results last month, followed by the former King’s Simeon II National Movement and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms.
Protestant Revival in Bulgaria
On November 10, 1989, a day after the border between East and West Berlin opened, the Bulgarian Communist leader of over 30 years resigned and change toward democracy began (Lalkov, 62-63). For those of us, who lived in the final days of Communist Bulgaria, the Fall of the Wall was a modern-day miracle. Emerging from severe Communist persecution and surrounded by the Balkan religious wars, the country of Bulgaria suddenly experienced a time of liberation. Before our very eyes, began a national spiritual revival despite a collapsing economy and political insecurity. Read more
Election Results and Regrets or What Just Happened in Bulgaria?
While the eyes of the world were turned to the tragedy in the subway, Bulgarian democracy lost yet a new parliamentary election. Coalition for Bulgaria, the newly renamed Bulgarian socialist party with communistic heritage swept the votes with 34%. The majority party of the past four years, Simeon II National Movement led by the former Bulgarian king remained second with 22% and the Turkish ethnic group Movement for Rights and Freedoms followed with 14%. The in-split democratic forces entered the election in three separate wings to win a total of 21% as neither one of the three passed the 10% barrier. Similarly, and surprisingly for all, was the win of the newly formed movement Ataka (Attack) which grabbed over 8% of the nation’s voters. The last remains under suspicion because of its controversial campaign incorporating nationalistic and chauvinistic propaganda with anti-ethnic messages.
It is only a guess if the elections were fair, with approximately 50% national participation and over one million Bulgarians living and working abroad. Regardless, a government with socialist majority should be expected. Such will enforce extreme left direction in politics similar to the time before the Berlin Wall.
Bulgaria’s entrance into the European Union will be delayed and the cooperation with NATO will be only minimal. Salaries may increase slightly, while prices will change drastically. The price of gas and bread have already gone up with hardly any time to forget the pre-election promises of political peace, economical prosperity, wellbeing of the people and security for the future. Promises will not be kept; in fact, they are already being broken. It is clear, that the Bulgarian people will suffer.
A socialist cabinet in can mean only one thing for the protestant movement in the country. The government will have authority and use it to strictly reinforce the new religious law. Orthodox monopoly over religious life will remain strong and the government will interfere in the business of the church through endless legalities or police force, much similar to the raids of July, 2004.
This is not new for the church in Bulgaria which went through a similar depression in 1996-97. It was during that time that the Bulgarian Christian Coalition was established to represent the evangelical believers in Bulgaria. Due to organizational, leadership and strategy flaws the Coalition received only 21,000 votes – hardly enough to enter Parliament. This failure should be a wake-up call for the Bulgarian Protestants, and especially for the Pentecostal majority among them. If the church indeed lives a political theology, as Moltmann claims, it is time for the church in Bulgaria to regain its rightful social place.
Bulgaria and Romania Urged to Speed Reforms
By Judy Dempsey, International Herald Tribune
The European Union’s top official responsible for enlargement issued a blunt warning Tuesday to Bulgaria and Romania, telling them their membership in the EU in 2007 would be postponed if they did not implement necessary reforms. ”I am proposing to recommend postponing membership if one or both countries cannot implement reform,” Olli Rehn, the EU’s enlargement commissioner, said during a meeting in Berlin hosted by the Institute for European Politics and the European Commission. But in contrast to his remarks on Bulgaria and Romania, Rehn, a Finn and former politician, said EU member states should not close the door on Turkey despite increasing skepticism among Europeans toward enlargement. ”Europe needs a stable, democratic and prosperous Turkey that will adopt our values and rule of law,” Rehn said. ”It is in our strategic interests.”
Rehn’s warnings were made after his meetings with Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer of Germany and Angela Merkel, leader of the opposition conservative Christian Democrats, who is campaigning to oust Chancellor Gerhard Schroder, a Social Democrat, in elections expected in September. Merkel supports the entry of Bulgaria and Romania into the EU despite the slow pace of reforms in both countries, but she opposes granting full EU membership to Turkey, even if Turkey meets all the EU’s conditions. Instead, as she stated in her party’s election manifesto published Monday, the Christian Democrats and their sister party in Bavaria, the Christian Social Union, want a ”special partnership of Turkey.” The Christian Democrats said full EU membership of Turkey would undermine the integration of Europe. Many members inside the Christian Democrats and the Christian Social Union, however, often say the reason why they do not want Turkey admitted as a full EU member is because the EU would be undermined as a ”Christian club.”
Rehn, a staunch defender of enlargement as a tool for exporting security and stability, openly challenged the view that Turkey’s membership in the EU would slow integration. He even questioned what was meant by a ”privileged partnership.” ”Widening and deepening of the EU can continue at the same time or at different paces,” said Rehn, whose country has always supported enlargement and political integration. ”The point is that EU accession is the perspective for Turkey to continue the reforms. Europe needs a stable, democratic and prosperous Turkey that will adopt our values and the rule of law. It is in our own strategic interests.”
As for granting Turkey a privileged or special partnership, Rehn said it already existed. ”There is a customs union for trade and economy,” he said. ”The political dialogue is deepening. Turkey is part of the EU’s crisis management operations in the Balkans. In other words, some would say this already represents a privileged partnership.”
Rehn’s public warnings to Bulgaria and Romania represented a grim reflection of the two strands of skepticism running through many of the 25 EU member states, particularly after the rejection of the EU constitution by France and the Netherlands last month. One strand is directed against more integration, coupled with increasing criticism over the way the commission, as the EU’s executive arm, interferes too much in policy making. The other strand is the growing skepticism toward any future expansion, particularly into Turkey, Bulgaria, Romania and the western Balkans, which includes the countries of the former Yugoslavia. Rehn said the recent enlargement in which the EU expanded from 15 to 25 countries and any future ones demanded higher standards. ”European enlargement has been stretched to its limits,” Rehn said. ”There is a need to be very cautious about our new commitments but at the same time stick to our current commitments. Bulgaria and Romania can join the EU in 2007 if they fulfill the conditions.” This is why the issues of corruption and the weak rule of law in Bulgaria and Romania had to be ”addressed to reassure the public,” Rehn said. ”This is where conditionality is important,” he added. ”Corruption is a most problematic issue, whether it be in the Western Balkans or Eastern Balkans. We still have problems with corruption and reform of the judiciary in Bulgaria and Romania. So let’s focus less on commitment and more on delivery.”
Bulgaria and Romania are still hoping to join the EU in 2007, a date agreed on by the 25 member states during their summit last December in Brussels. Five months later, both countries signed the accession treaties even though the commission still had reservations about the pace of reforms in both countries as well as their ability to implement their reforms by 2007. In the past, the commission but particularly the member states that actually make the final decision over whether a country is ready to join or not, often turned a blind eye to issues related to implementation of laws, combating corruption and even the way the structural or regional funds allocated to poor regions were spent. Rehn insisted the commission would issue a monitoring report on both countries next October. Then, either in March or April, it will issue a final decision over whether either was ready to join by 2007, he said.
20% Favor Socialist Leader
Socialist leader Sergey Stanishev enjoys the support of 20% of the Bulgarians for becoming the country’s next prime minister.Stanishev has been backed by 20% of the people, who participated in the Barometer Info survey. The data announced by Lyubomir Stoev also showed that the outgoing Prime Minister Simeon Saxe- Coburg has the support of 10% of the people.
The leader of the election surprise nationalist coalition Attack (Ataka) Volen Siderov has been favored for prime minister by 6%, whereas former prime minister and leader of Democrats for Strong Bulgaria Ivan Kostov garnered 5%.The majority of the participants, 45%, pointed other political leaders as most appropriate for the prime minister’s post. The survey was executed June 29 to July 1 and was participated by 510 Sofa citizens.
Government by Socialists
“The formula on the next Bulgarian government is already clear, a local news source said Saturday. The Cross website said that the Socialists Party and Turks-dominated Movement for Rights and Freedoms would claim state power. Cross, a source believed to be close to the socialists, said that Sergey Stanishev would certainly be prime minister. The agency cited “”sources close to the process of coalition talks.””
Members of the Simeon II National Movement will be included in the government. However, the former King’s party will not be part of the ruling coalition, the reports said. The agency did not specify whether its sources are members of the Socialist Party or not. Meanwhile, negotiations between the separate parties continued on Saturday, when the SP met right-wing coalition Bulgarian National Union (BNU). The two sides indicated that they were unlikely to coalesce.”
