BULGARIAN CHRONIC CORRUPTION IS WORRISOME

In 2013, the level of administrative corruption in Bulgaria affecting the population and the business sector remained practically the same. Bulgaria is still among the EU Member States with highest corruption risk. The parliament (National Assembly) and government are yet to come up with any specific initiative to meet the higher public expectations for prompt results in the fight against political corruption. There is no visible improvement in the performance of the judicial system. The examples of continuing poor management practices, creating serious risks of political corruption and arousing suspicions in the will and capacity of Bulgarian officials to tackle corruption, multiplied in 2013.

• A series of (attempted) appointments by the government and the Parliament of people without proven track record and expertise or with questionable reputation, to key positions in the administration, including to institutions designed to fight corruption and organized crime;
• Speedy preparation and adoption of laws, including laws containing lobbyist clauses, without public consultations and analysis of costs and benefits;
• Lack of a comprehensive strategy for reform in the security sector, and in particular in the fight against corruption and organized crime;
• Public disclosure of facts from on-going investigations, before the collection and verification of all facts, including purposeful sabotaging of corruption investigations involving figures from the political elite and officials from economic sectors with high corruption risks (such as the energy sector), as well as the intervention of the Bulgarian prosecution in the political process;
• Replacement of a significant part of the executive administrative staff after the new government was formed, without analysis and justification of the replacements;
• Confrontation and politicing of the civil protests that aim to create new moral in politics, by application of political engineering and the abuse of party apparatus.

The result is lack of progress in the anti-corruption reform. Political coruption in Bulgaria remains unpunished. Corruption in general is not prosecuted effectively and adequately. Activities of the legislative, executive and judicial powers continued to be unclear and ineffective. The integrity of Parliament was seriously shaken following a series of poor legislative decisions and appointments. The strong interest of politicians, business and financial groups toward high standing officials in the judiciary, behind-the-scenes political arrangements and attempts to influence judicial decisions are still a deep-rooted practice, despite the declared principles of separation of powers and independence of the judiciary. The Supreme Judicial Council, both in its previous and in its current composition, remained susceptible to illegitimate pressure. The behaviour of many prosecutors and judges at various levels is quite similar. State capture by powerful business groups has become even more visible, with serious political influence exercised through the concentration of financial and media resources.

Lobbying in Parliament

The Bulgarian National Assembly has obvious deficiencies in its work in several areas: First, it has failed to pass a code of ethics for MPs or a law on lobbying. Second, the policy exprtise of the legislature is rather limited, which prevents it from being an effective check on legislative initiatives of the government. Hence, the role of the Bulgarian Parliament in promoting and assuring integrity is still rather limited.

There are still no adequate legal rules on avoiding conflicts of interest. Even patent situations of incompatibility and conflicts of interest alone are sufficiently scandalous to undermine the reputation of the nation's supreme representative body. The negative and demoralizing effects of such parliamentary coziness, the lack of guarantees for impartiality and objectivity also spill over to other state institutions, and to the whole society. First, because the Members of Parliament pass the country's legislation; second as they elect the leaders and, at times, also the members of many other state institutions; annd third, as unlike the anonymous civil servants, the MPs are well-known and may only find shelter behind their untouchability.

The Rules of Organization and Activity of the National Assembly fail to proclaim any restriction on the amount of additional remuneration (honoraria) received under service contracts (regulated by civil law), nor any prohibition on that remuneration becoming the primary source of income for a Member of Parliament. By the same token, no attention is given to the possible conflict of interests between the work of an MP and the civil law relationships in which he or she might be involved. The rule on gifts contains no deadline and fails to define the total value of the gifts that an MP might be permitted to accept.

The lack of transparency in the work of the Parliament continues to cause reasonable doubt that some laws in Bulgaria are adopted to serve private political and/or business interests. The measures taken for publicity, such as the live broadcast of the plenary sessions on the parliamentary website, do not represent a sufficient guarantee against illegal lobbying practices in the legislative process. Key legislative amendments are adopted without proper justification of the need for them and without prior expert and public debate.

The 42nd Parliament at the very beginning of its term demonstrated a flagrant disregard for the rules of transparency and public participation in the preparation and adoption of new laws. A good example of this were the amendments to the Law on the State Agency for National Security adopted in June 2013. Their preparation, consideration and adoption revealed serious shortcomings in the legislative process and questioned the independence of the supreme legislative authority. The adoption of the law (within the record-breaking period of ten days between its submission and adoption) disregarded the general principles of justification, stability, openness and coordination of regulations. It also violated the legal requirements for prior publication of the draft and its justification on the website of the Parliament and provision of at least 14 days for suggestions and opinions. The explanatory report to the draft, which must point out the reasons and objectives of the proposed changes, the means for their implementation and the expected results, did not contain any legal or financial justification of the expected results. Substantive arguments were replaced by political rhetroric while some of the most significant changes such as the reduction in requirements for holding the office of Chairperson of the State Agency for National Security (SANS) (accompanied by a significant increase in the powers of the Agency) were not addressed at all.

The second main function of the Parliament, namely the election of heads or members of other government bodies, is also accompanied by a lack of transparency and inappropriate dependence on private interests. The problems range from a total lack of publicity and participation of civil society, as in the case of the election of the Chairrperson of the State Agency for National Security, to unreasonably delaying the election months after the term of office has expired, as in the case of the Inspector General of the Inspectorate with the Supreme Judicial Council.

The standing parliamentary Anti-Corruption and Conflicts of Interest Committee has failed to establish itself as an effective mechanism to prevent and counter corruption. Instead of coordinating the anti-corruption activities of the different branches of power (legislative, executive and judicial), the Committee deals with individual MPs who have not complied with the deadline for filing their conflict of interest declarations and avoids engaging in more serious coordination or strategic tasks.

The time has come for Bulgaria to put its house in order! and for the European Commission to step in not just by making declarations that it is worried about the pace of anti-corruption reforms but in offering real assistance by providing needed training in ethics management.

In  November 2010, the Chair of AALEP  participated in a two-day conference in Sofia, Bulgaria on “The Roles of Lobbyists.” The event, aimed at members of the National Assembly of the Republic of Bulgaria, was facilitated by the Economic Policy Institute in Bulgaria with funding from U.S. Embassy. The purpose of the conference was to engage with members of the National Assembly and their staff about the lobbying practices, laws, and regulations in the United States and throughout the European Union as the National Assembly deliberated on the extent to which Bulgaria should develop lobbying laws and codes of ethics. Subsequently, the Chair of AALEP met privately with the first woman to chair the 41st National Assembly Mrs. Tsetska Tsacheva to share views on the importance of defining the 'rules of the game' for both lobbyists and lobbied. That was three years ago and admittedly since then nothing has happened and as a matter of fact things have gotten worse.

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