BULGARIA’S CARETAKER GOVERNMENT WANTS THE COUNTRY TO JOIN ERM II

Bulgaria’s caretaker Government has the ambition to submit an application for joining the Eurozone waiting room - the Exchange Rate Mechanism - ERM2, caretaker Prime Minister Ognyan Gerdzhikov told journalists on 1st of March.

Gerdzhikov said that Bulgaria met three of four criteria, but the issue was political and consultations would be needed with the current members of the Eurozone. He added it was a tough task, a lot of work needed to be done and there were no guarantees for success, he added.

The Prime Minister and Deputy Prime Ministers gave a report in the Council of Ministers for the work done by the caretaker cabinet in the first month of governance.

Regarding the appointment of the chief of Defense, we decided to stop the situation in which the post was occupied by an acting head, Deputy PM Stefan Yanev said. We chose an appropriate person for the post, based on professionalism and military experience as well as his place in the hierarchy, he added.

I would not call personnel changes a purge, Gerdzhikov said when asked to comment on the appointments and dismissals in the last month. The caretaker cabinet of Stefan Sofiyanski in 1997 changed all district governors with one decision, while we have left a few, Gerdzhikov said.

It is possible that after the elections to get into a spiral, which is not good for anyone, Gerdzhikov said answering a question about how long his government would run. We will continue to fulfill our obligations until the regular government gets elected or until the President decides to appoint another caretaker government, he said.

The issue of the appointment of an EU commissioner is very delicate Gerdzhikov noted. According to him, EU commissioner will not be nominated before the elections on 26th of March, but will be nominated after that because Bulgaria has not had EU commissioner since the beginning of the year.