SOFIA, Nov 10 (Reuters) – Two young Harvard-educated entrepreneurs hope to use anti-corruption credentials earned during a brief stint in a caretaker government to break Bulgaria’s political deadlock in Sunday’s election and put the country on road to prosperity.
Graft has long been the dominant political topic in the EU’s poorest country, and voters have pinned their hopes on successive leaders pledging to clean up public life, only to see administrations crashing in scandals.
Kiril Petkov, 41, and Assen Vassilev, 44, set up their new centrist party, We Continue the Change, in September, and polls show they could become a key part of talks to form a new administration following two inconclusive elections since April.
“We are promising zero corruption. This is what we are going after. No small tolerance, nothing, zero. We are going to try to eradicate it,” Petkov told Reuters in an interview.
The group is running neck-and-neck with the leftist Socialists for second place ahead of Sunday’s parliamentary vote, giving it a fighting chance to lead talks on a coalition government.
Opinion polls show the centre-right GERB party of former Prime Minister Boyko Borissov, ousted in the April election, will be the biggest party after Sunday’s vote. But it is short of allies, giving it little chance to form a government.
Serving for about four months as interim economy and finance ministers earlier this year, Petkov and Vassilev gained public support for efforts to uncover wrongdoing in state institutions under Borissov.
In May, Petkov found that state-run Bulgarian Development Bank, set up to support small business, had extended 946 million levs ($559.43 million) in loans to just eight companies.
Vassilev boasted of boosting tax collection by 2.5 billion levs by increasing controls on big businesses that operate with public and EU funds.
“Between corruption and waste, you are looking at about 4 billion euros a year,” Vassilev said.
Petkov, who has filed documents to relinquish Canadian dual citizenship to qualify for office in Bulgaria, has invested in start ups and ran a successful probiotics company. Vassilev is also an entrepreneur and business consultant.
Supporters see their youthful charm and casual manner as a breath of fresh air, a particularly striking personal contrast with the burly, bullet-headed Borissov.
Their rivals say their emphasis on reforms is more a matter of style than substance, and conceals a drive for power which makes them just like other politicians. Some worry that they simply look and sound too good to be true.
Political wrangling prevented GERB’s opponents from building a government in the previous two elections this year. Petkov pledged things will be different this time.
“We are not going with an ego in the negotiations, we are going with a cause….You will see a very different mindset in the negotiations that are to come,” he said.
($1 = 1.6910 leva)
Reporting by Tsvetelia Tsolova
Editing by Peter Graff
OTTAWA – Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says the NDP is caving to political pressure from Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre when it comes to their stance on the consumer carbon price.
Trudeau says he believes Jagmeet Singh and the NDP care about the environment, but it’s “increasingly obvious” that they have “no idea” what to do about climate change.
On Thursday, Singh said the NDP is working on a plan that wouldn’t put the burden of fighting climate change on the backs of workers, but wouldn’t say if that plan would include a consumer carbon price.
Singh’s noncommittal position comes as the NDP tries to frame itself as a credible alternative to the Conservatives in the next federal election.
Poilievre responded to that by releasing a video, pointing out that the NDP has voted time and again in favour of the Liberals’ carbon price.
British Columbia Premier David Eby also changed his tune on Thursday, promising that a re-elected NDP government would scrap the long-standing carbon tax and shift the burden to “big polluters,” if the federal government dropped its requirements.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
Simon Jolin-Barrette, minister responsible for consumer protection, has tabled a bill to force merchants to calculate tips based on the price before tax.
That means on a restaurant bill of $100, suggested tips would be calculated based on $100, not on $114.98 after provincial and federal sales taxes are added.
The bill would also increase the rebate offered to consumers when the price of an item at the cash register is higher than the shelf price, to $15 from $10.
And it would force grocery stores offering a discounted price for several items to clearly list the unit price as well.
Businesses would also have to indicate whether taxes will be added to the price of food products.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
Quebec legislature member Youri Chassin has announced he’s leaving the Coalition Avenir Québec government to sit as an Independent.
He announced the decision shortly after writing an open letter criticizing Premier François Legault’s government for abandoning its principles of smaller government.
In the letter published in Le Journal de Montréal and Le Journal de Québec, Chassin accused the party of falling back on what he called the old formula of throwing money at problems instead of looking to do things differently.
Chassin says public services are more fragile than ever, despite rising spending that pushed the province to a record $11-billion deficit projected in the last budget.
He is the second CAQ member to leave the party in a little more than one week, after economy and energy minister Pierre Fitzgibbon announced Sept. 4 he would leave because he lost motivation to do his job.
Chassin says he has no intention of joining another party and will instead sit as an Independent until the end of his term.
He has represented the Saint-Jérôme riding since the CAQ rose to power in 2018, but has not served in cabinet.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 12, 2024.
