The danger comes when a sheep flock decides to become a wolf pack. Then comes the time for the shepherd to raise his stick and force the flock back into the pen.
Valentin Kasabov, MP for National Front for Salvation of Bulgaria, about the antigovernment protests
Borisov behaves like a karate player at a chess game. You move the figures and he kicks the board.
Slavi Trifonov, TV anchor and leader of the There is Such a People party
Things in Bulgaria are rarely what they seem to be, but of course there are exceptions. Look at Boyko Borisov's government and his most loyal GERB-ers. Look at the pictures of the prime minister sleeping across his bed, wads of 500-euro bills in his bedside drawer and a gun positioned by his head.
Yet few expected something as dramatic as that: iPhone snaps of a half-naked prime minister sleeping across his bed, a bedside cupboard full of wads of 500-euro bills. Plus several gold ingots. Plus his favourite gun positioned on top. The images, anonymously sent to several media and subsequently widely circulated to the general public, might have befitted an underworld boss after an orgy of booze, sex and gambling rather than the prime minister of an EU member state. But photos do not lie. Welcome to the bedroom of Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov.
Boyko Borisov, Bulgaria's prime minister during the past 11 years, may have many faults, his critics say, but he is without a doubt a master of the Bulgarian language. Borisov's virtuoso use of the lingo plays on many levels. His uncouth nativism enchants some domestic audiences, especially cab drivers and horsecart repairers. At the same time his obsequious promises of police cooperation endears his Western counterparts.
The reduced VAT on baby food will, pray God, stimulate people to have more children.
Economy Minister Emil Karanikolov
The General Prosecution Office's reluctance to take in the many flagrant scandals and signals for huge corruption and theft of public money is a sign of fear and dependencies.
President Rumen Radev
Democracy is for disciplined people.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov
Predictably, the coronavirus emergency has made all other events in what remains the EU's poorest and least free state look like insubstantial tidbits. With very few exceptions all media have focused exclusively on the alarmist press conferences of Gen Ventsislav Mutafchiyski, the military doctor who heads the emergency staff, and on the lifts Prime Minister Boyko Borisov has given to his ministers in his private jeep to inspect unfinished stretches of road.
The Prime Minister told me: 'If I were a woman, I would knock it off with you'.
Epidemiologist Dr Atanas Mangarov, who has opposed the lockdown measures
Culture is a whim of luxury. When the world has stopped working, how can we be concerned with culture?
Vezhdi Rashidov, former GERB culture minister
You have the rare chance to be governed by us. Under President Radev, people would have been dying.
Since 13 March 2020 Bulgaria has been run by three generals and a sheriff. First and foremost comes General Ventsislav Mutafchiyski. A surgeon installed to manage the Military Medical Academy in Sofia, Mutafchiyski rose to prominence when he was appointed the head of the emergency National Operative Headquarters. Neither a virologist, nor a psychologist he is seen at daily news briefings where he utilises his military schooling to give out what is in essence increasingly restrictive commands to ban citizens from moving about and gathering together.
Political science students all over the world are being taught in the early stages of their studies that the best way for an authoritarian government – any authoritarian government – to enhance its own powers is to use a crisis – any crisis – as a justification. The bigger the crisis, the bigger the opportunity. At a time of a huge crisis it becomes easier to take away citizens freedoms and rights not only with a couple of decrees, but also with the general public applauding from the sidelines.
Anarcho-liberal circles claim that the Bulgarian chief prosecutor is omnipotent and controls everything. This is not true. This is propaganda.
Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev
Buying 50 kg of sugar will not boost your immunity.
Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev
The most polite policemen possible will patrol the hospitals.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov
This is not the time to talk about democracy.
Traffic rules are the same for both millionaires and honest citizens.
Ivaylo Ivanov, General Secretary of the Interior Ministry
Last week in Sofia we had a London type of fog while in summertime we get a Los Angeles type of smog.
Georgi Rachev, climatologist
Trump commended his ally, Bulgaria, for spending as much as 3 percent of its GDP on defence (Germany should take an example of that, according to Trump) and for having recently concluded a deal to buy some US F-35 fighter jets (Bulgaria is actually about to buy F-16s). Speaking at the National Democratic Institute in DC Borisov told the Americans to "go on quarrelling at home," but assured Bulgaria would welcome both Republicans and Democrats.
We lost in the places where we did not win.
Finance Minister Vladislav Goranov on the local elections
GERB is like your own spouse. You get fed up with them, for a moment someone younger and blonder looks more appealing, but then you realise that your old partner is good enough, so you return home and you keep quiet.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov on GERB voters
Is there a prime minister who is closer to the people, who is more approachable?
Daniela Daritkova, chairwoman of the GERB parliamentary group
It is hard to establish who pollutes the air because air is everywhere.
Environment Minister Neno Dimov
Of course I know computers! I have certificate for basic computer literacy.
Deputy Prime Minister Mariana Nikolova on her appointment as head of the Cybersecurity Council
We want our EU commissioner to be responsible for something modern, like cybersecurity or management of IT technologies.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov
Unemployed IT specialists? There is a high demand for shepherds in this country.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov in 2011
The hackers have to be recruited to work for the state as they have unique brains.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov in 2019
Mr Borisov takes care of the whole country.
Borislav Mihaylov, President of the Bulgarian Football Union
What will probably go down in history as the dullest election campaign in Bulgaria post-1989 was marked with a single trait. Politicians vying to get into the European Parliament (with all the goodies this entails, including salaries of about 8,700 euros per month plus copious allowances plus good pension plans, and so on and so forth – unthinkable for ordinary Bulgarians or for Bulgarian national MPs) resorted to a tried-and-tested technique to woo voters: scaremongering.
Europe is a part of Eurasia and it is bad not to communicate with Russia.
Volen Siderov, leader of Ataka
As a mayor, I was ashamed to walk on Graf Ignatiev Street.
Yordanka Fandakova on the quality of repairs in Central Sofia
I don't mess with God's deeds. Our God Jesus Christ appointed both the pope and the patriarch. I don't want to comment on his choice.
Prime Minister Boyko Borisov
No, it is not the constantly being stopped and restarted multibillion-euro Belene Nuclear Power Plant project, it has nothing to do with Bulgaria's continuing dependency on Russian gas and oil, nor with the state of the Bulgarian judiciary system.
We are the only European capital named after a temple and probably the only city named after God.
Todor Chobanov, Culture and Education Mayor of Sofia, on why Christ was chosen as the emblem of the city's 140th anniversary as a Bulgarian capital
Our football is like a tavern with a live band: you enter and you order the music.
TSKA coach Lyuboslav Penev
We will help Notre Dame with restorers and icon-painters.