Photo: DPS Shumen Region Facebook page
“Not a single vote less!” – this was the order given to village leaders by Ismail Ibryam, mayor of the emblematic Deliorman municipality of Nikola Kozlevo, in connection with the upcoming early parliamentary elections. Ibryam is one of the four mayors of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) – New Start in the Shumen region, and in the last parliamentary elections, the municipality he controls was a “top performer” in supporting Delian Peevski, who has been sanctioned for corruption by the US and the UK. In the October 27, 2024, vote, Peevski’s party received a record 73.5% of the votes in Nikola Kozlevo, and the 43% voter turnout was the highest in the region.
Now Ismail Ibryam has ordered a repeat of the complete election victory, according to municipal councilors from Nikola Kozlevo. “Ibryam has set a task for every village mayor: not to allow a single vote less than in the previous elections,” said a local political activist.
The ranks of New Beginning are already being formed
The ranks of DPS-New Beginning in Shumen are already being formed for the upcoming early parliamentary elections, which are expected in March 2026. On January 8, a meeting of the municipal council of DPS-New Beginning was held in Nikola Kozlevo, at which a municipal election headquarters was elected and a schedule for meetings in the settlements was adopted. The information was published on the Facebook page of DPS – Shumen Region. The photos show that the meeting was chaired by the mayor of Kozlevo, Ismail Ibryam, who is seated in the center, surrounded by municipal councilors and administration officials. Close to Ibryam are Deputy Mayor Sevgin Ahmed and the director of the municipal enterprise “Nikola Kozlevo” Jemil Aziz, who is also the municipal coordinator of New Start.
Among those attending the party meeting of the DPS-NN was the chairman of the Municipal Council in Nikola Kozlevo, Khalil Rufat, one of the wealthiest local administrators (according to declarations to the Anti-Corruption Commission) and closely associated with former Kozlevo mayor Eshref Redjeb. Before becoming head of the Municipal Council, Rufat was chairman of the NDP group of councillors, under whose “banner” Rejeb’s people ran in the local elections. In the first year of the term, the “Eshrefoglu” group and the supporters of the new mayor Ismail Ibryam were at war, but after the split in the DPS and Ibryam’s move to Peevski’s faction, the tension between the former enemies melted away and now they sit at the same party table.
How elections are held in Nikola Kozlevo
For years, the small municipality of Nikola Kozlevo has been seen as a “symbol” of controlled voting. Voters in the area traditionally follow the party affiliation of the mayor, who in such poor municipalities “holds both the bread and the knife.” For two decades after the 1990s, voters in Kozlevo, mainly ethnic Turks, strongly supported the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF), and the mayors were invariably activists of Ahmed Dogan. In 2015, Eshref Rejeb, nominated as a candidate by GERB, took over as mayor and remained in office for two terms until 2023, when he was removed from office due to a conflict of interest. Voters, who had been loyal to Dogan until then, abruptly changed their political preferences and began voting for the municipal mayor’s party (GERB). Another emblematic election result from this period came in one of the largest villages in Kozlev – Varnari, which became popular as “400 out of 400”. In the parliamentary elections on April 4, 2021, out of 401 ballots cast for GERB in Varnari, 400 were for Ilter Beizatov, son of the former head of Palamara Beizat Yahya, who was second on the list.
Controlled voting continued with the next municipal mayor. In the last parliamentary elections on October 27, 2024, the mayor of Kozlevo, Ismail Ibryam, quite demonstratively and in violation of election rules, stood in the polling station in Vlani and openly observed the voting process. Ibryam did not leave the room, even after being filmed by Zaytuna reporter Diyana Zhelyazkova. Instead of leaving the polling station, the mayor of Kozlevo began threatening the journalist.
Meanwhile, several police officers stood in front of the polling station without taking any action against the mayor who was violating the rules. When asked why they did not intervene in this blatant violation of election rules, the police officers explained that they could only enter the polling station if they were summoned by the chair of the polling station commission (PSC). The chair of the SEC, meanwhile, remained conveniently silent and looked at the ground, not daring to oppose the municipal mayor. All members of the polling station commission did the same. Later, the Shumen prosecutor’s office, which had been specifically notified by journalist Diyana Zhelyazkova, terminated the investigation into the scandalous case with the explanation that there had indeed been a violation on the part of the Kozlevo mayor, but that this violation had been terminated after the intervention of the District Election Commission. The prosecutor’s office ruled that if the journalist felt affected by the mayor’s threats, she should file civil lawsuits and seek her rights through private channels.
Now, based on these prosecutorial and police inactions, the mayor of Kozlevo can feel completely untouchable and unpunished, and secure even 110% of the votes in his municipality in the same way that he secured Peevski’s complete election victory in October 2024.
The chairman of the DPS-Kozlevo and his scandalous appointment
The coordinator of “New Beginning” in Nikola Kozlevo, Jemil Aziz, is the long-time director of the scandalous municipal enterprise “Nikola Kozlevo,” which became famous for its involvement in illegal construction and the illegal catch of two tons of fish in 2024.
Azis should have been dismissed from his position at the end of February 2024, when the Municipal Council refused to accept the annual report of the company he managed. According to the rules, in such a case, the mayor of the municipality, Ismail Ibryam, must dismiss the director of the municipal company. Instead of worrying about the situation, Jemil Azis caused a real scandal at the session and literally quarreled with the councilors for asking him for explanations and wasting his time.
Just a week later, Aziz gave another reason for dismissal. On March 7, the police intercepted the illegal transport of two tons of fish, freshly caught in the reservoir in the village of Karavelovo, which is managed by the municipal enterprise “Nikola Kozlevo.” The illegally transported fish was seized, and IARA officials drew up a report of an administrative violation. A day later (March 8), a pre-trial investigation was launched into the case for a crime under Article 201 of the Penal Code. Article 201 states that “an official who embezzles foreign money, goods, or other valuables handed over to him in his capacity or entrusted to him for safekeeping or management shall be punished for embezzlement with imprisonment of up to eight years, and the court may order the confiscation of up to half of the guilty party’s property and deprive them of their rights under Article 37, paragraph 1, points 6 and 7.”
The pre-trial proceedings are being conducted against an “unknown perpetrator,” but are directed at the municipal enterprise that manages the dam. And the official who manages and is responsible for it is none other than director Jemil Aziz. Municipal councilors and local residents believed that after this criminal case, Aziz would be dismissed, but nothing of the sort happened. The municipal mayor, Ismail Ibryam, who is Aziz’s direct employer, refused to remove the scandalous boss, who turned out to be his relative.
Then the municipal councilors from the NDP openly attacked Aziz and asked him how the revenues from fishing and the sale of fish from the Karavelovo dam were accounted for. “We have repeatedly told the director (Azis) that he must accurately report the revenues from the dam and separate the revenues from fishing fees and fish sales. One type of revenue comes from fees, the other from commercial activity, and they should not be mixed. He continues to report them together, and we cannot control which revenues come from what,” Khalil Rufat commented at the time. Now he and Jemil Aziz are sitting at the same table, organizing the elections for Peevski’s party.
In the elections on October 27, 2024, DPS-New Start won the most votes in the Shumen region. Peevski’s party received 24.94% (13,516 votes) in the region. In practice, most of the votes were secured by four small municipalities in Deliorman, former DPS strongholds, whose mayors abandoned Dogan and switched to Peevski after the split.
The municipalities of Varbitsa, Nikola Kozlevo, Kaolinovo, and Venets mobilized over 10,600 votes for the DPS–New Start in October 2024 and sent two MPs to parliament. Peevski’s voters mainly voted with paper ballots—84% of the support for the party was on paper.
