Sueddeutsche Zeitung: Bulgaria's Propertyless Tsar

Domestic | December 21, 2009, Monday // 17:11|  views

“The tsar is angry and despite his usually discrete character this time he could not suppress his feelings,” Sueddeutsche Zeitung wrote in an article about Simeon Saxe-Coburg. Photo by BGNES

The German newspaper “Sueddeutsche Zeitung” published an article about Bulgaria's former Prime Minister and tsar Simeon Saxe-Coburg and last week's decision of the lawmakers to bar the royal family from using property returned to them by judges over ten years ago.

Under the ban, Simeon Saxe Coburg, who became tsar in 1943 at the age of six and was forced into exile in 1946, and his sister Maria-Louisa cannot sell, rent or build on land returned to them by a Constitutional Court decision in 1998.

“The tsar is angry and despite his usually discrete character this time he could not suppress his feelings,” Sueddeutsche Zeitung writes, referring to the accusations that Saxe-Coburg threw at the lawmakers of breaking the law and the constitution.

“Don't forget we live in the 21st century and Bulgaria is a full member of the European Union, not a Soviet State,” the declaration, as cited in the newspaper, reads.

The article tracks down the outline of the conflict, starting from the election of Simeon's grandfather for a regent of Bulgaria through the nationalization of the royal family property, an act that was declared unconstitutional in 1998.

"The ownership of the property became a hot topic in 2001, when Simeon Saxe-Coburg swept the general elections to be named prime minister of Bulgaria,” Sueddeutsche Zeitung writes. The article adds that the prime minister was thrown out of office in 2005 but retained his influence as member of the three-party ruling coalition together with its allies the Socialist and the ethnic Turkish parties.

“Even back then his political opponents accused Saxe-Coburg of taking advantage of his power to settle all property issues,” the article says and forecasts that this will be a hot topic for quite some time in Bulgaria.

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Tags: Strasbourg, Hristina Hristova, Ombudsman, ECHR, NDSV, Saxe-Coburg

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