After on February 11 the left-wing parties and the DPS party demanded a vote of no confidence in the government over its healthcare policy, in the coming week parliament must rule on the matter. Strong indications that the healthcare sector is not the main motive for the vote as well as the actual ratio of forces in the legislature raise expectations for a sterile political debate and a negative outcome. The idea for a no-confidence vote was born in the ranks of the Socialist Party in January. During consultations for support on behalf of the MRF also options were discussed for a no-confidence vote due to problems with internal security and demography. The problems with the judiciary, corruption and organized crime referred to in the last EC report on Bulgaria were not among the options and clearly for the importers it is more vital to trigger a debate just about anything. On the other hand, a successful vote of no confidence requires121 votes, while the Left wing has 38 and the DPS only 30 votes.

Even if more votes are added to the already known support of two independent MPs it is not realistic to expect that the total amount would exceed 121 votes. Importers know this very well but the debate on the no-confidence motion interests them even with a negative outcome. The aim is not so much to harm the government as to get an idea of the balance of power in parliament after the internal turmoil in the DPS, exploring the internal tensions in the Reformist bloc involved in the governance and testing the level of support for the ruling politicians by the parties not in power such as ABV and the Patriotic Front.

The expected negative outcome will reinforce the sad tradition in Bulgaria for having no successful vote of no confidence for already a quarter century and it is only used as a tool for debate and not a legitimate means of change in power. Not accidentally, Prime Minister Boyko Borissov demonstrated enviable tranquility, commenting that "there must be a vote of no confidence; it is bad if there is no such vote..." And with good reason, after his first cabinet survived four motions of no confidence tabled by the BSP and DPS - in October 2010 because of the policy in the field of healthcare, in June 2011 because of failure of the anti-crisis policy, in July 2011 because of the failure of the policy on internal security and public order, and in April 2012 - for stopping the project for Belene NPP and failure in the energy policy.

In today's political realities we could only speculate whether following yet another failure of a no-confidence motion against his government, Borissov will remain true to himself to the end, by requesting and winning a vote of confidence in parliament as it happened in January 2011. 

English version Rossitsa Petcova