The people's representatives lost 20 minutes of their working time today in a meaningless dispute over the agenda of the plenary session. The conflict erupted after the rearrangement of the legislative agenda, when the deputies from "Continuing Change - Democratic Bulgaria" reacted sharply to the refusal to consider their request to hear the Minister of Internal Affairs Daniel Mitov, 8 uniformed and two additional officials.
The chair of the session Natalia Kiselova categorically refused to include the request in the agenda, citing procedural rules. "The National Assembly is not a convention, the National Assembly is not a court", she said, explaining that she cannot allow a proposal rejected by vote to be resubmitted within a month, the "24 Chasa" newspaper writes.
Bozhidar Bozanov from the ruling coalition expressed dissatisfaction, pointing out that they had requested this point from the presidential council, and accused the leadership of applying double standards.
Dragomir Stoynev from the Bulgarian Socialist Party joined in defending the president's decision, who with undisguised irony addressed the opponents: "You are the smartest, most intelligent and best lawyers. But you didn't have time to at least fix the reasons". He added, referring to Article 47, paragraph 5 of the Rules of Procedure, that "there was no consensus during the consultations, therefore the Chairperson considers that it is not included in the agenda".
Yordan Ivanov from "Democratic Bulgaria" strongly objected to such an interpretation, insisting that the procedure does not require consensus, but simply a vote on the proposed proposal. He did not fail to note the real motives behind the request: "The real motives that we should have put forward, but we spared the BSP - we are doing this because of Mr. Angelov's thumb last week, after which they changed their vote. We thought their vote had been changed. Do not thwart this mechanism for parliamentary control, put it to a vote".
Nikoleta Kuzmanova from "There Is Such a People" provided additional legal reasoning, pointing out that care must be taken with the definition of the term "officials". "The only place where this is defined is Article 91, point 1 of the Criminal Code. The experts to the Constitutional Court, whom we heard, have not acquired the status of an official, because they do not fall within the categories of this law," she explained.
With undisguised sarcasm, Ivaylo Mirchev from "Democratic Bulgaria" reminded Kiselova that she was elected with the votes of GERB, and their leader Boyko Borisov last week publicly promised to hold such a hearing. "We know that he keeps his word - if he were in the hall, he would have kept his promise. "Propose a vote so as not to disappoint him," the MP suggested.
Despite heated debates, the topic of the hearing never made it onto the parliament's agenda for the current week, which shows the ongoing tension between the ruling and opposition parties regarding the mechanisms for parliamentary control.