On top of the Bulgarian cabinet crisis following the failure of the rotation of prime ministers, a constitutional crisis is looming as appointing a caretaker premier appears to be increasingly difficult.

According to changes to the constitution made under the outgoing government of Nikolay Denkov, in the case of a cabinet crisis, the president no longer has the right to appoint a caretaker prime minister of his choice.

Instead, the president must choose from a list of high officials considered potential caretaker prime ministers. The list includes the speaker of the parliament, the governor of the National Bank and deputies, the Ombudsman and deputies, the head of the Court of Auditors and deputies – a total of nine people.

The change in the constitution was made to prevent President Rumen Radev from governing via caretaker governments during the spiralling cabinet crises and successive snap elections.

Bulgaria is heading for its sixth parliamentary election in three years, during which Radev has had four caretaker cabinets.

After Mariya Gabriel (GERB, EPP) withdrew her candidacy for the prime minister position, the president handed over the mandate to form a government to ‘We Continue the Change – Democratic Bulgaria’ (PP-DB) which said that it cannot form a cabinet.

In the last third attempt on Thursday (28 March) Radev gave the mandate to ‘There is Such a People’ who returned the mandate immediately

The three attempts to form a government having failed, the president immediately started consultations with the officials considered as potential caretaker prime ministers.

However, the Govenor of the National Bank Dimitar Radev said it would be wrong to involve the National Bank in the political process, signalling that he and his deputies would reject the nomination.

The leader of GERB, Boyko Borissov called on the president not to appoint the speaker of the Parliament Rossen Zhelyazkov and the head of the Court of Auditors, as both are political appointees of GERB.

The post of caretaker premier should be held by a politically neutral person.

At the same time, the Ombudsman Diana Kovacheva, seen as the most politically independent in the list, will leave her post on 17 April to take the job of Bulgarian judge at the ECHR, while her deputy Elena Cherneva-Markova resigned on Wednesday.

This means that the only potential candidate for now is the Deputy Chairman of the Court of Auditors Gorica Grancharova-Kozhareva. She was elected to this post during the second “Borissov” cabinet.

However, constitutional experts have warned that it would be a conflict of interest if after having served as caretaker prime minister, the head of the Court of Auditors would audit its own cabinet.

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