The deputy from "DPS - New beginning" Yordan Tsonev told BNT that so far no one has asked them for support for the Speaker of the Parliament. He criticized the PP-DB for breaking a long-standing parliamentary tradition of the Speaker of the National Assembly being the most powerful political force and added that new early elections are increasingly likely.
"Since we have not been asked for support, we will not give it. If they ask us for it - we will talk", emphasized Tsonev.
"With the arrival of the PP-DB in the Bulgarian political system, many important constitutional traditions that strengthen the institutions came to an end. One of them was in all the years until 2021. the Speaker of the National Assembly to be nominated by the largest political party. These people broke the institutions, broke the state, they are anarchists.
BNT: Are we heading for new elections?
- Everything suggests that this is where we are heading, unfortunately. We want a regular government, but if there are early elections we will have a better result. I have done campaigns from 1990 until now, I have participated in every possible election. For the first time since 1997, when we did the SDS campaign in places, I saw energy in our sympathizers. I tried to figure out why. People believed, our sympathizers, that Delyan Peevski can make a new beginning not only in our party, but also in Bulgarian politics, because he is energetic and a workaholic."
On the occasion of the expulsion of Ahmed Dogan from the DPS, Yordan Tsonev said that he does not feel remorse.
"The statute is categorical that anyone who has appeared from another party, or supports another party, or campaigns for another party in an election, is automatically excluded. We have only verified this automatic exclusion."
According to "Alliance for Rights and Freedoms" however, currently excluded from Congress in the summer, they are trying to steal the authentic DPS.
"We are excluded from an illegitimate forum because it was seen that there is no quorum - firstly, and secondly - the grounds for exclusion - we are not talking here, in our case, we are talking about people who are already MPs from another party" ;, pointed out Tsonev.
According to his words, Ahmed Dogan did not agree to nominate Peevski as co-chairman of the party.
"When I declared my will to stay in "New Beginning", because I was not asked to resign and I had the right to choose, I made my choice and said what the reasons were. The background is that after Mr. Dogan stepped down, he started appointing chairmen who I wouldn't say had bad qualities per se, but he was appointing them as puppets. And we supported what the party supports.
Delyan Peevski was nominated by all party organizations. And when he was nominated unanimously, then Mr. Dogan, faced with the fact, he did not agree. And we knew that, and I knew it personally from Delyan Peevski. Yes, he wanted to nominate a new chairman, but the party nominated Mr. Peevski, and he then nominated him. He nominated him because the whole party had already nominated him.
In the course of this campaign, he decided then to nominate him, but I told you that the first disappointment came from the fact that the people he appointed were acting as puppets, listening only to him, what he said, and he to he told us that he had retired from active politics, but de facto that was not the case. And the confirmation came when in the previous 50th parliament we had to vote for the Zhelyazkov cabinet. I think there was an agreed majority and the "Zhelyazkov" cabinet would be a fact.
Early in the morning, at 9:15, Chakarov arrived and told the entire parliamentary group, he arrived with an order from Mr. Dogan, to vote against. I personally asked with what arguments, after two weeks we and the president said that we would vote "for" the first political force and from the program declaration from the rostrum of the National Assembly we said the same. With what arguments? Chakarov answered me that the honorary chairman does not give arguments, he gives an order to vote like this. Practically then, we broke up", Yordan Tsonev stressed.
However, he noted that the big disappointment was during the campaign when voters were "crushed" on an ethnic basis.
"But the big disappointment came after this separation, when in the group "I support Dogan" on Facebook, which is administered by Ilvan Atila, who is very close, by the way, to Mr. Dogan, ethnic tension started - you are betraying, are you Turks betraying the party to the Bulgarians, I said it then on this television, that I am surprised that Mr. Dogan allows this. And let me tell you in the campaign, it was brutal. The ethnic Turks and the Bulgarian Muslims, who are not of Turkish ethnic origin, were terribly crushed and repressed. On the phone, in conversations. Why are you betraying the Turkish ethnicity? Why did you go to the Bulgarians? Why do you allow the Bulgarians to take over DPS? DPS is our Turkish party. Just to tell you, if you want, many sympathizers who are ethnic Turks and Pomaks who stayed in "New Beginning" have recordings on their phones. They recorded these conversations about how they were crushed on an ethnic basis. You are traitors to the Turkish ethnicity."
According to his words, people from Dogan's closest entourage - Ilvan Atila, Ramadan Atalai, Jevdet Chakarov, Sevim Ali, Emel Etem - called.
"They called mayors, sympathizers, activists, acquaintances, all kinds of people. They complained and faced a serious moral dilemma. They accuse them of being traitors to the ethnicity, how so? Look, this whole thing Mr. Dogan allowed it. And I unreservedly, unquestioningly believed in the words about ethnic tolerance. I was literally ready to swear by it, and when I saw it now in the course of the campaign carried out by his inner circle, to tell you the truth, I think I crossed out my life's work. Mr. Dogan practically erased his life's work, allowing the circle around him to make people stay around him only on ethnic grounds."