Velizar Enchev, Founder of "Bulgarian Spring" Movement: It Is Time for Radical Break with Neoliberal Policies

Velizar Enchev has a degree in journalism from the Sofia University "St. Kliment Ohridski." He was a correspondent of the Bulgarian National Television in former Yugoslavia in the period 1987 - 1993. He was Bulgaria's Ambassador to Croatia in the period 1997 - 2002. After that Enchev was TV host of a broadcast of SKAT TV. He entered the 43rd National Assembly as MP from the Patriotic Front. After a scandal with one of the leaders of the coalition, Valeri Simeonov, Enchev left the parliamentary group of the Patriotic Front and founded a new political movement, the Movement for Radical Change "Bulgarian Spring."

- What made you think it was time to establish a new political movement? What niche is the Movement for Radical Change "Bulgarian Spring" targeting?

After the return to power of the GERB party (Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria) and the establishment of yet another corrupt coalition with the participation of the Reformist Bloc, the Patriotic Front and the Alternative for Bulgarian Revival, which was an act which subverted the vote of Bulgarians, it emerged that it was necessary to restore moral standards in politics. This is why me and a group of friends decided to propose a radical alternative to the political status-quo, with the new formation seeking to unite broad layers of society demanding social justice and a new social contract.

The parties of the so-called transition period are passé in political terms and have fallen into moral disrepute due to the catastrophic economic situation which made Bulgaria the poorest EU country.

Young people in Bulgaria lack life chances and are forced to idle their life away unemployed or to emigrate. At the same time, elderly people live...