Bulgarian populists keen to join EU conservative bloc

9 months ago 27

Populist formation There Is Such a People (ITN), established just two years ago, has announced its intention to join the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR).

With the upcoming EU elections set to be held in June next year, ITN has a real chance of winning a least one seat of the total 17 that are set to be allocated to Bulgarian MEPs.

“Our big role in the European elections will be to fight Euroscepticism by explaining that the more conservative representatives there are in the EU, the more normal it will be,” the leader of the ITN parliamentary group Toshko Yordanov said during the weekend in Sofia on the opening of the sixth conference “Western Balkans”.

The event is organised by the New Direction – the Foundation for European Reform, whose vice-president is Angel Dzhambazki – the MEP from the Bulgarian nationalist party VMRO, which is part of ECR.

According to Yordanov, it is logical for ITN to join the family of conservative parties, because conservatism is an “ideology of common sense”.

“Common sense says there should be freedom of the economy. Common sense says that the family should consist of a man and a woman and that your sexual orientation should not give you an advantage over others,” Yordanov commented.

“The interesting thing is that common sense in the Balkans is greater than common sense in the West,” Yordanov, quoted by BTA, added.

ITN is currently polling at about 5% but hopes to increase support for being in opposition.

At the start of the week, the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP), which will fight for two to three seats in the European Parliament, also announced that it will form a new patriotic network together with dozens of Russophile and patriotic formations – including maybe ECR member VRMO as it is among the parties invited.

On 30 November, the Party of European Socialists (PES) said it stands ready to take all necessary measures against its local member in Bulgaria BSP after it announced its intention to form a broad coalition with pro-Russian, nationalist parties, PES Secretary General Giacomo Filibeck told Euractiv.

If the Bulgarian socialists are excluded from PES because of their nationalist turn, there is a real possibility that at least half of the Bulgarian seats in the new European Parliament will favour Eurosceptics and anti-European parties.

The largest anti-European party in Bulgaria is Vazrazhdane, which hopes for at least 20% of the vote and is building ties with Germany’s far-right AfD.

(Krassen Nikolov | Euractiv.bg)