After at the end of the past political season it turned out that constitutional amendments related to judicial reforms would not receive majority in parliament, a new draft bill signed by 180 MPs from all parliamentary groups with the exception of Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and Ataka was brought to the National Assembly days before the summer vacation. The proposition of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) party for asking the Constitutional Court whether the amendments should be made after convening Grand National Assembly was also accepted. Expectedly, the court did not start any proceeding as preliminary interpretations were not admissible.

On Wednesday the changes to the constitution were accepted with the vote of 184 MPs. All parliamentary groups voted in favor of the changes, with the exception of the Bulgarian Socialist Party. One vote in favor came from the ABV party but what was surprising is that the decisive support came from the Ataka MPs. The bill provides for the division of the Supreme Judiciary Council into two colleges of judges and prosecutors, as well as for direct election of judiciary members of the council, and increasing the power of the inspectorate at the council. The Supreme Bar Council will now be able to file appeals to the Constitutional Court.  After passing at first reading the bill may go to parliament for second reading in two weeks. MRF and ABV see problems in the way political and professional quotas in the prosecution are formed. The Reformist Bloc are expected to propose once again texts regarding accountability and the ability of the Minister of Justice to speak during meetings of the Supreme Judicial Council. The GERB party said they were expecting a written statement from the Venice Commission despite voiced support.

Debates in parliament made Mihail Mikov from BSP voice his criticism.

“Today’s changes are made by an insecure majority that needs to ask the Constitutional Court first. This same insecure majority is waiting for the Venice Commission to make a statement. What if it said that the changes were not in accordance to judicial independence? Whom are you going to ask then?”

It is not hard to guess that adopted constitutional changes do not guarantee judicial reforms but give official start of discussing them. More directly said – the start of political bargaining.

“Signals related to this vote show that the difficult part is yet to come,” says analyst from the Centre for Liberal Strategies Dimitar Markov. “From the statements of those who supported the bill it becomes clear that this is a formal request for demonstrating political will but this is not true support for specific texts. There will be debates and discussions before the second reading. There will be no law for making amendments to the constitution before the local elections. I think the process is deliberately slowed down in order to see what the balance of political forces will be. After the elections, the parties will come up with different positions on the basis of the results. This small step can be assessed as positive. If it had not happened, we would have witnessed the collapse of the judicial reform.”

English: Alexander Markov