Comment by Emilia Milcheva:
Recalculation of the election results of October 27, 2024 - yes. Reorganization of the 51st National Assembly - also, but within the framework of the parliamentary groups, not with a new ninth formation like “Majesty”, as predicted by an expert and the head of “Information Services” Ivaylo Filipov. But new elections, partial or full - no. This is how the outcome of the case in the Constitutional Court (CC) regarding the massive violations of the vote, the honesty of which was questioned by all parties, except GERB-SDF and MRF-New Beginning. Although the party "Velicie" claims that according to the results of the recount, their formation has overcome the barrier to entering parliament.
Meanwhile, the CEC sent the data received from "Information Service" to the Constitutional Court, but will not make them public. The real effect, however, is something else - the collapse of the already shattered legitimacy of the electoral process.
The reason?
It turned out that in addition to the bought and controlled vote, substituted votes and manipulated preferences, the evidence of the vote itself - the ballots - is also disappearing. And the institutions busy solving the problem have shown that they are incapable of coordination and dialogue.
President Rumen Radev did not miss the scandal with the compromised election process to note “a feeling that a line is being crossed, beyond which democracy becomes impossible”. But democracy does not have a point of irrevocable collapse, Bulgaria has gone through a totalitarian regime and the consequences have not yet been fully overcome. Electoral violations are an existential threat, but not an inevitable fate if the institutions and the rule of law are strengthened.
How did it get here
When everyone expected the Constitutional Court to rule on the fifth month since the beginning of the case, institutional brakes suddenly appeared. They come from two key units – the Central Election Commission (CEC) and “Information Service” (IE), as well as by a player such as the prosecutor's office, which was notified by the IE.
The CEC ensured the transportation of the ballots from the 2204 polling stations under inspection to the Constitutional Court, where experts hired by it as experts began their recount. The IE was supposed to recalculate the results, and the CEC was supposed to check whether the data entered by the company corresponded to its protocols.
Just before the end of the process, however, the head of the IE, Ivaylo Filipov, alerted the prosecutor's office: 780 ballots were missing from the bags handed over to the Constitutional Court. Instead, there were scissors, staples and other stationery. The Constitutional Court experts counted these "results" as "zero", although the video surveillance and the protocols signed by all parties represented in the Constitutional Court clearly show that - these votes were cast.
Missing evidence
But as the parliament conveniently decided with changes to the Electoral Code - video surveillance is not evidence. The missing evidence - cuts from machine voting and paper ballots - had to be kept until the next elections, by law. After each vote, the bags with the ballot papers are sealed, signed and handed over to the municipal administration, and the premises are secured and cannot be opened without an explicit decision of the CEC or the Constitutional Court.
Along with the missing ballots, the experts found incorrect protocols in over half of the 2,204 polling stations checked. For example, when a vote was correctly cast for a party, but more than one preference was marked, the ballot was declared invalid, in violation of the Electoral Code. The experts counted these ballots as actual votes for the parties.
However, the Constitutional Court prohibited the publication of the table from the experts' expertise. After the call for transparency raised by politicians, the Constitutional Court explained that expert opinions are published after the case is over, for which it referred to its rules.
Where was the prosecutor's office before
The process of checking the results revealed absurd actions that even the parliamentary hearings were unable to explain. “Information Service“ - the company that summarizes the results from 12,000 sections in three days, does not find time to enter the actually counted ballots within a week. Instead, it referred the matter to the Sofia City Prosecutor's Office.
According to the Chairperson of the Constitutional Court Pavlina Panova, the Election Commission handed over materials on the constitutional case to the prosecutor's office, along with the technical media and devices - without the court's permission. In parliament, however, Ivaylo Filipov denied this, explaining that the CEC had provided the information, which they had copied onto two flash drives and returned "immediately to the Constitutional Court".
And the prosecutor's office? Instead of taking action in January, when one of the experts appointed by the Constitutional Court during the recount of the ballots - Prof. Krasimir Kalinov - publicly announced that he was missing, it waited for a signal from the state-owned company. However, the actions of Bulgarian prosecutors have invariably followed the unwritten law that they act "on order", not according to expediency. But Prof. Kalinov, a statistician and election expert, confirmed in parliament his expectation that it would take action.
Where are the politicians
The politicians wasted two parliamentary days on the case, listening to representatives of the CEC and the Election Commission, as well as experts. Finally, divided into critics of the Constitutional Court, who therefore support the prosecutor's office, and others, they adopted another declaration. Supported by GERB-SDF, BSP-OL, ITN and DPS-Novo, it calls on the Constitutional Court to make all documents public and to carry out “additional actions to collect evidence for identification”.
None of them took responsibility for the compromised electoral legislation, the not very effective CEC, which includes representatives of parties that have been removed from political life, and the lack of transparency in the work of the Constitutional Court, where judges are appointed by parliament, the president and the guild. Despite calls for impartiality, it is no secret that political affiliations do not stop with their election to the Constitutional Court, defined by many as the “upper chamber of parliament”.
The missing 780 ballots do not prevent the Constitutional Court from making a decision. However, the Ministry of Interior and the Prosecutor's Office owe answers as to what happened and who is responsible for their disappearance. What will "Majesty" do, expecting the Constitutional Court's decision to pass it over the 4 percent barrier as the ninth force in the 51st parliament? After protesting in front of the home of GERB leader Boyko Borisov in Bankya, she is probably looking for Peevski's address.