From the Facebook profile of Irina Yordanova
Why did Boyko Borisov and GERB appoint Anton Hekimyan as mayor of Sofia? He is a journalist. But why not? This question is as valid as others: Why was the rector of Sofia University Atanas Gerdzhikov a presidential candidate? Why was the neurosurgeon Nikolay Gabrovski nominated for Prime Minister? Why did the pilot Rumen Radev become president? Why was the sculptor Vezhdi Rashidov the chairman of the National Assembly? I can ask similar questions ad infinitum.
Is it right to deprive ourselves of capable Bulgarian men and women in politics because they were journalists? And this applies to any profession. In a very accurate article, another journalist, Valery Naydenov, gives examples of journalists who have taken the path of politics. Some of them are our heroes such as Winston Churchill or Andrey Lyapchev. We think of others as villains. For example, Mussolini or Lev Trotsky (I add him, as he was also a correspondent in Bulgaria during the Balkan Wars before the Bolshevik revolution).
But some are positive and others are negative examples, not because they were journalists. Our judgment of them should be based on their ideas and activities as politicians, not whether they were journalists. I was also a journalist, which prepared me to be an advisor to the President of Bulgaria and a municipal councilor for four terms.
I was amazed when I heard Vasil Terziev say that a “Chinese wall between the media and politics” is needed. If he had said these words about the need for journalists to be objective, I would have agreed. But he attacked his rival in the mayoral election, Anton Hekimyan. Because he is a candidate for a post that Mr. Terziev seems to think he is born with.
Or in politics there are benches only for “whites” and only for “blacks”. It is possible for IT specialists, but not for journalists. As Orwell wrote: “all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.” No, Mr. Terziev, we journalists are not second class people. And in conclusion. It is great to do events, Neri Terzieva told me when we worked together in the team of President Petar Stoyanov. Every journalist who has worked for a long time and in a key position in a large media has sometimes thought that they can make events, and not just cover and comment on them. To make events to change something for the better. Why not?
