Zhelyu Mitev Zhelev (; 3 March 1935 – 30 January 2015) was a Bulgarian politician and former dissident who served as the first democratically elected and non-Communist president of Bulgaria, from 1990 to 1997. A member of the Union of Democratic Forces, he was elected as president by the 7th Grand National Assembly. Two years later, he won Bulgaria's first direct presidential elections. He lost his party's nomination for his 1996 reelection campaign after losing a tough primary race to Petar Stoyanov.

Biography

Early life

Zhelev was born in 1935 into a modest village family in Veselinovo in north-eastern Bulgaria. He studied philosophy at Sofia University, graduating in 1958 and gaining a PhD in 1974, a remarkable achievement given that he was under a cloud as a dissident, having been expelled from the Communist Party in 1965. After his expulsion he endured years of “social parasitism”, or unemployment in communist terminology, which he spent in virtual internal exile in his wife’s village, scraping a living from odd jobs on farms.

Dissident

Zhelev was a member of the Bulgarian Communist Party, but was expelled from it for political reasons in 1965. He was unemployed for six years since all employment in Bulgaria was state-regulated.

In 1982, he published his controversial work, Fascism (Фашизмът). Three weeks after the volume's publication in 1982, the book was removed from bookstores and libraries throughout the nation, as its description of the fascist states of Italy, Germany and Spain before, during, and after World War II made these regimes comparable to the Communist regimes in the Eastern Bloc.

SDS

In 1988, just before the Fall of Communism, Zhelev founded the Ruse Committee, and in 1989 he became a founding member and chairman of the Club for Support of Openness and the Reform (a time when many such democratic clubs were formed), which helped him to achieve the position of Chairman of the Coordinating Council of the Union of Democratic Forces (Bulgarian: СДС, SDS) party.

MP and President

Zhelev was elected MP in June 1990 for the 7th Grand National Assembly; the Assembly's main goal was to create a new democratic Constitution of Bulgaria. After the resignation of President Petar Mladenov, the assembly elected Zhelev his successor on 1 August 1990.

In 2009, Zhelev also voiced his opinion that Bulgaria should adopt a presidential system based upon the French model: "The country should have both prime minister and president, but the latter should be vested in far-reaching powers so that he may control the executive power".

Zhelev died in Sofia at the age of 79 on 30 January 2015.

World Justice Project

Zhelyu Zhelev served as an Honorary Co-Chair for the World Justice Project (ABA).

Family

He was married to Maria Zheleva (3 April 1942 – 8 December 2013) and has two daughters Yordanka (1963–1993) and Stanka (born 1966).

Zhelev has two grandchildren from his daughter Stanka.

Awards and accolades

On 15 January 2010, Zhelev received the Order 8-September for his contribution to the recognition of the independence of the Republic of Macedonia from the former Yugoslavia.

Zhelev Peak on Loubet Coast, Antarctica is named after Zhelyu Zhelev "for his support for the Bulgarian Antarctic programme."

National honours

  • : Grand Cross of the Order of the Stara Planina (3 March 2005)

Foreign honours

  • : Grand Cross of the Order of Civil Merit (1993)
  • : Grand Collar of the Order of Liberty (1994)
  • : Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland (1994)
  • : Grand Order of Mugunghwa (1995)
  • : Order 8-September (2010)

References

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