Bulgarian PM submits proposal to dismiss government

Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov submitted a proposal for a no-confidence vote on his cabinet, Sofia news agency novinite.com reported February 20.

“As it was announced earlier on Wednesday, Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov handed the resignation of his cabinet to Parliamentary Chair Tsetska Tsacheva,” novinite.com wrote.

Borisov announced that his whole cabinet will resign on Wednesday afternoon. The shocking news follows a series of protests, which have spread throughout Bulgaria, following what many viewed as exceedingly high electricity bills in December 2012.

Bulgaria’s Finance Minister Simeon Djankov was the first head to role; he resigned on Monday. Djankov was unpopular in Bulgaria for his strict fiscal policies despite helping “Bulgaria maintain its currency peg to the euro even as its economy shrank more than 5 percent in 2009,” UK news wire Reuters commented.

“My resignation has not been voted by the parliament yet, so formally I continue to serve as Bulgaria’s finance minister,” Djankov said, according to novinite.com. “It will be my aim over the next few weeks and months to work with Prime Minister Boyko Borisov, so that at the next elections GERB may win full majority and rule one more term.”

Djankov’s words were not accepted by Borisov, who said that the disgraced Finance Minister would not be part of a new GERB government, and that he had no intention of working with Djankov on anything in the future.

Discontent among Bulgarian’s has been fueled by two cases of self-immolation. One man died in recent days in Ruse and the another, who set himself in fire in front of the city authority building in Varna, is in hospital with serious burns.

Parliament is expected to vote on the cabinet’s resignation on Thursday.