Socialist Party Firm Govt Will Not Resign

Plamen Oresharski’s cabinet will not yield to public pressure to step down, the leadership of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) said on Wednesday.

Thousands of people have been rallying in Sofia for 40 days, accusing the government of serving oligarchic interests, and demanding its resignation. On Tuesday night protesters blocked the exits of the National Assembly, trapping inside some one hundred people, including MPs, ministers, representatives of the trade unions and journalists until the early hours of Wednesday morning. An attempt by the police to get a group of MPs and ministers out of the parliament building by a bus at about 10.00 p.m. failed, leaving a dozen people, including policemen, injured.

New snap elections will not change anything, BSP leader Sergei Stanishev told an extraordinary news conference on Wednesday. 

For their part, the opposition centre-right GERB, the so called Reformist Bloc of parties which are not represented in Parliament, and one of the two major trade unions in the country reiterated their calls on the government to resign. 

Parliament will resume work on Thursday with a debate on a planned budget revision.