The Central Election Commission (CEC) decided to accept the documents of the two groups in the MRF at the same time to avoid disputes over which group submitted the documents first. The decision was made after a nearly one-hour meeting of the Commission, preceded by a four-hour deliberation.
Two teams, each consisting of two CEC members, will handle the task. The protocols will record the same time for the submission of the documents.
Since the previous evening, the MPs from the two factions in the MRF associated respectively with Delyan Peevski, Dzhevdet Chakurov and Ahmed Dogan, occupied the CEC offices where the registration documents for participation in the elections are accepted. The procedure was supposed to start at 09:30 a.m., but tensions between the two groups prevented the Commission from proceeding with its work, as each of the factions feared that the other would be registered first. As a result, the two CEC members on duty gave up trying to accept the documents and called an emergency meeting of the Commission.
During the extended meeting, which included multiple breaks, five different options for resolving the situation were discussed. Among these were proposals for the CEC to request another room from Parliament Chairman Raya Nazaryan, to refrain from issuing sequential numbers, and to seek assistance from caretaker Minister of Innovation, Rosen Karadimov, who is responsible for election organization. There was even discussion about relocating the Commission to another building.
The CEC does not have its own building and operates in the former Party House, which now serves as a meeting hall of the National Assembly. This necessitated consideration of the idea of a temporary relocation or assistance from Raya Nazaryan. The suggestion to use another room in Parliament, made by CEC member Dimitar Dimitrov, was rejected. Instead, the Commission discussed two other rooms in the same building, where documents are currently being accepted, but it was concluded that these rooms would also be easily accessible to MPs.
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