A before and after analysis of 1927’s Bulgarian Parliamentary elections held in conditions of terror and after years of low-level civil war. An attempt to form a bloc of labor with the agrarian workers parties, the Social Democrats, and Communists (having been made illegal running as the Workers Party) was partially successful, with the ‘toilers’ opposition’ winning 24% of the votes in an election of dubious legitimacy for its reactionary winners.

‘The Communist Party and the Parliamentary Elections in Bulgaria’ by R.P. from International Press Correspondence. Vol. 7 Nos. 33 & 35. June 2 & 16, 1927.

Declaration of the C.P. of Bulgaria on the Parliamentary Elections in Bulgaria.

[The following declaration was issued by the C.P. of Bulgaria before the Parliamentary Elections. In spite of the monstrous government terror, the elections, which took place on the 29th May, have resulted, in a defeat for the government, the Communists obtaining five seats and the Left wing peasant league 58 seats, which shows a great strengthening of the radical opposition compared with the previous parliament. Ed.]

The fact alone that the Communist Party of Bulgaria, which before the coup d’état of June 9th 1923 rallied round it about 225,000 working class and other working electors, is today outside the law and exposed to the most fearful persecutions on the part of the fascist government of bankers and generals, and deprived of every possibility of taking part openly and directly in the election campaign, sufficiently illustrates the violent and fascist character of the elections for the National Council called for the 29th of May and the results which are to be expected from the elections. It is thereby proved beyond all doubt that these elections are not called in order to give “free expression to the will of the people”, but in order, by the reactionary election system, by unexampled election terror, and by machinations of every sort, to get a “Parliamentary sanction” (in one form or other) in order to justify the ruling system, a system which for four years has been plundering and throttling the mass of the people and torturing and crushing their advance-guard in the most bestial manner.

But precisely for this reason it is the task of the proletariat, of the working peasants and small business people, and all workers of any description in the country, to exert themselves all the more, to weld their forces together in order that this election fight shall result in a fearful blow to their worst enemy, the coalition government, the “Democratic Union”, to its regime of cruel terror and fascism, of robbery and destruction, of handing over the country to foreign imperialism and delivering the Bulgarian people to the new militarist, counter-revolutionary and anti-Soviet Balkan combination.

The Malinov-Kjortchev-Tomev coalition is a bourgeois opposition, which, at bottom, is not against the fascist policy of the government, but merely aims at an extension to the whole bourgeoisie of the advantages and privileges enjoyed by bank and speculating capital. This coalition is the reserve of the bourgeoisie in view of the circumstance that the ruling regime is politically bankrupt. The Malinov coalition is preparing, together with the Ljaptcheff wing of the “Democratic Union”, a new third edition of the government of 9th July 1923, a government combination of extra-Parliamentary fascist methods.

The opposition of the working masses to the bourgeois opposition coalition and their refusal to support it in the election, is, therefore, quite comprehensible and justified.

The Malinov coalition and the government coalition are. also opposed by the coalition of the leadings staffs of the Peasant League, of the Social Democratic Party and the Party of the small traders. The leaders of this coalition are striving in vain to represent this coalition in the eyes of the mass of the people as a “block of iron”. According to its composition and its programme this coalition is very far remote from the workers. Without the participation of the proletariat, without the masses of the poor peasants and small traders, a block of the workers and an earnest and consistent fight against the emergency regime and fascism are unthinkable, just as is the fight against the methods of the 3rd of June which have brought untold injury to the people and the country.

This coalition represents an election platform which puts forward the demands of the masses of the people in a vague and elastic form, which does not expressly raise the demand for the abolition of the defence of the realm act, the dissolution of the fascist organisations, and the rescinding of the decision regarding the dissolution of the proletarian organisations.

This election platform does not put forward the economic demands of the workers (eight-hour day, labour protection, land and agricultural credits and against the burden of taxation). It does not come forward on behalf of the hundreds and thousands of refugees from Macedonia, from Dobrudsha and Thrace; it does not speak definitely for the national independence of the Macedonians, the Dobrudshanians and Thracians, nor for their separation from the States which have annexed their territories with force. It merely demands the “cultural autonomy” of the national minorities, that is to say, the perpetuation of the present dismemberment of Macedonia, Dobrudsha and Thrace and of the foreign regime of force prevailing in these provinces.

This platform does not oppose foreign imperialism in the Balkans and does not stand for the free union of the Balkan peoples in a Balkan Federation, which is the only means of preventing Bulgaria being involved in a coming war. The combinations for the preparation of such a war are directed before all against the Soviet Union, instead of restoring political and economic relations with the Soviet Union. In short, this platform of the leading staff of the Peasant League, of the Social Democratic Party and of the party of the small traders is anything but a fighting platform of the working masses; it is not a platform of the block of the workers in the election struggle. On the contrary, it is nothing else but a breach in the front of the workers, a stab in the back of the fighting masses in view of its furious enemy.

The masses have perceived this, they showed a clearer political insight than the mandate-hunting leaders of the peasants League, of the social democracy and of the small traders. As a result the masses are energetically striving on a local basis to transform that coalition into a real block of the workers.

The Communist Party of Bulgaria declares most emphatically that only by means of the block of the workers can an improvement in the present unbearable situation of the broad masses be achieved. Only by such a block can these masses be preserved from fresh misfortune, from fresh dangers of war and severe trials for which the fascist bourgeois government is heading.

In spite of the furious election terror, all workers, all right-thinking and unbribable elements in the country must rally decidedly to the fight under the slogans:

Down with the “Democratic Union!” Down with the fascist emergency regime! Down with the defence of the realm act! Full political amnesty for the victims of the white terror! Dissolution of the fascist organisations! Restoration of the organisation of the workers!

Freedom, bread and peace for the working people! Against the imperialist subjugation of Bulgaria and the Balkans!

Against war adventures!

For the union of the Balkan peoples in a Balkan Fede- ration of Workers and Peasants Republics!

Resumption of relations with the Soviet Union!

Forwards to the setting up of the power of the workers, of the workers’ and peasants’ government!

Long live the Comintern and its Bulgarian section!

The Central Committee of the Communist Party of Bulgaria.

The Result of the Parliamentary Elections in Bulgaria. by P.R. (Sofia).

It was with unheard-of cynicism that on the day after the Bulgarian Parliamentary elections, Lyaptcheff declared that they had taken place without the least disturbance of the peace.

So as to win through at any price, the Lyaptcheff Government had mobilised the entire police apparatus and the Fascist organisations. In this connection the Government made use of the following means of “propaganda”:

The prohibition or “mobbing” of meetings of any party of the Opposition; the arrest and internment of the Opposition agitators and candidates; the blockading and inundation of entire districts with police, detectives and so-called “apex-commands” (Fascist militant bodies); the dissolution of Oppositional district councils and the appointment of Government commissaries to replace them; an economic coercion, especially against the peasants, by the repeal of the permission to graze or glean firewood in State pastures or forests and the threat of collecting all tax arrears should the debtor fail to vote for the Government; the destruction of the electioneering correspondence and publications of the Opposition in the post-offices and the confiscation of Oppositional voting papers as illicit matter; the organisation of political trials on a huge scale in the month just preceding the elections, and the like. Even now that the elections are over, the press of the Opposition is full of accounts of acts of terrorism.

Political murders and the “disappearance” of individuals again began to occur. The peasant publication “Zemledelsko Vasrashdanye” was again and again confiscated by the police for having dared to ask the Government the whereabouts of P. Dragneff, a peasant candidate from Stara Zagora, who was arrested by the police and then completely disappeared. According to press reports, the following members of the Opposition were assassinated during the few weeks preceding the elections: Michael Ilieff, a member of the Peasant Union from the village of Rakovsky, the murderer being a Fascist called V. Dobrikoff (“Zemlesdelsko Zname” of May 21st); Marin Ilieff, murdered in the village of Debnevo (Troyanko) by adherents of the Government, who were naturally never discovered (“Novini”); P. Vasileff, found stabbed in the town of Stara Zagora, the murderer having been a bribed soldier who was, of course, also not arrested (“Svobodna Ryetch” of May 1st); Saptcho Ilieff, shot by police and Fascists in the streets of Troyan, said by the “Utro” (a paper friendly to the Government) to have been “suspected of being a member of the Communist Party”.

All the arrested Opposition members were cruelly tortured; not even their wives and children were spared by the sadistic police. Thus the bourgeois-democratic party organ “Zname” of May 14th reports that the police fetched the children of Ivan Ekimoff and I. Alexoff (members of the Opposition) out of the elementary school and flogged them brutally at the police station.

In many districts, such as Orkhanye, Lom, Ferdinand, and the like, the electioneering terrorism assumed acute forms. Panic reigned at Orkhanye, where the Government candidates were colonel Calfoff (Minister of Foreign Affairs during the Zankoff Government) and St. Ivanoff (former district chief of police). These men knew no scruples in attaining their aim. Even the Government organ “Zora” (in close connection with Lyaptcheff) had on May 23rd to admit the extreme terrorism practiced in the Orchany region. Thus the editor-in-chief of this paper writes in an article bearing his signature: I went myself to Orkhanye so as to ascertain whether the rumours of terrorism were true, and I had to own that the form of terrorism prevailing there is scandalous. It would appear that the Orkhanye region is a mediaevally feudal district, the satraps of which are determined at any price to be elected as delegates. In spite of the steps I undertook with the various authorities towards mitigating the situation, nothing could be done in this direction.” (All in heave type in the “Zora” itself.)

It is impossible in a single article even to hint at all the cruel acts of terrorism perpetrated.

In spite of the outrageous terrorism it employed, the Government secured fewer votes than the Opposition. It owes its predominance in the Chamber merely to the reactionary election system, based on the principle of majority. The election victory of the Lyaptcheff Government is a “Pyrrhan” victory in a war against the working classes of Bulgaria.

The numbers of votes figured as follows:

Government Coalition with Stambolovists. Votes 521,246
Opposition, in all. Votes 562,078 (thereof: Toilers’ Parties: 305,894)
Bourgeois List in the Petritch District. Votes 37,809
Invalid Votes. Votes 12,000

The mandates, as recorded by the Government, are distributed as follows:

Democratic Sgovor (Government Party) 167
Stambolovists (allied with the Government) 6
Democrats 11
Social Democrats 10
Liberals 6
Radicals (Dissidents) 2
Smilovisti 1
Small Tradesmen 6
Workers Party 6
Peasant Union (“Vrabtcha”) 44
Tomovists (Right Wing of Peasant Union) 3
Neutrals (in Petritch District) 11

In many places the bloc of toilers’ parties was actually realised by the establishment of a united front between the Workers’ Party, the Peasant Union, the Small Tradesmen, and the Social Democratic Party. In all such places the Government suffered a decided defeat. In other places the formation of such a bloc was frustated as a result of the attitude of the petty bourgeois parties (Social Democrats, Small Tradesmen, and Peasant Union).

In the districts in which the Workers Party went independently to the elections, it netted 26,000 votes; in Sofia alone 5867 votes and two mandates. As regards the number of votes, the Government was beaten in every town, including the capital. The so-called “invalid” votes (12,000) count to the Opposition. These are the votes of the unlegalised lists of the toilers’ parties, which failed to be recognised as a result

of the Government terror and all manner of machinations. The votes of the Petritch district (general bourgeois list) also mainly benefit the Opposition.

Altogether the Opposition received 611,000 votes, as against 521,000 votes for the Government. The total number of votes of the Government, votes wrung from the population with fire and sword, was 521,000, or 39.1 per cent. of all votes registered. But thank to the magnificent election system, the Government nevertheless received the majority of mandates, a majority which will be made to serve as the Parliamentary cover for a sanguinary Fascist dictatorship.

The last word, however, does not rest with this “Parliamentary” Bulgarian Government, but with the working class and the rest of the toiling population of the country.

The ECCI published the magazine ‘Communist International’ edited by Zinoviev and Karl Radek from 1919 until 1926 irregularly in German, French, Russian, and English. Restarting in 1927 until 1934. Unlike, Inprecorr, CI contained long-form articles by the leading figures of the International as well as proceedings, statements, and notices of the Comintern. No complete run of Communist International is available in English. Both were largely published outside of Soviet territory, with Communist International printed in London, to facilitate distribution and both were major contributors to the Communist press in the U.S. Communist International and Inprecorr are an invaluable English-language source on the history of the Communist International and its sections.

PDF of full issue: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/inprecor/1927/v07n33-jun-02-1927-inprecor-op.pdf

PDF of issue 2: https://www.marxists.org/history/international/comintern/inprecor/1927/v07n35-jun-16-1927-inprecor-op.pdf