Screenshot from a video on Facebook.
The former chairman of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (before the party split) in the municipality of Sevlievo, Ismail Hadzhihasan (far left in the photo) is one of the founders of a new political project, which he says has nothing to do with Delian Peevski or Ahmed Dogan, but is against the policies pursued by both of them.
The new project is currently only a civil movement, but with ambitions to grow into a party, Hadzhihasan, who is a municipal councilor in Sevlievo and chairman of the DPS group in the local municipal council, told Za Istinata. Hajihasan, who is a municipal councilor in Sevlievo and chairman of the DPS group in the local municipal council, and has also been elected deputy chairman of the council, a role that is more representative in nature.
It is not a duplicate of the APS and has nothing to do with the DPS-New Beginning
The new civic movement does not duplicate the Alliance for Rights and Freedoms (APR) and DPS-New Beginning, but has ambitions to become an organization that gives priority to young people, who are expected to come up with solutions.
The civil movement “Obedinenie” will defend the term limits in politics because “a municipal councilor who has served two terms in the Municipal Council and wants voters to vote for him for a third term, what more can he do for them if he hasn’t done it already,” asks Hadzhihasan, adding that “this model caused the collapse of the DPS, and we saw where that led us.” He also predicts that the rotation of the same people on the lists will bring all parties the same fate as the DPS.
This is what awaits all parties if they do not allow new people to join.
He is adamant that he no longer wants to participate in tolerating the same people, which has alienated voters from politics altogether. He says that this is one of the reasons for citizens’ apathy and their declining interest in elections, and hence the melting electoral turnout. This process has not spared the DPS in the municipality of Sevlievo, where the party used to get 2,300 votes, but recently has barely managed to get 1,300.
In fact, the DPS in the Gabrovo region relies mainly on voters from several villages in Sevlievo, and every DPS candidate for parliament has been aware that if they win in Sevlievo, they have a chance of winning a seat in Gabrovo. This has happened more than once, despite the obvious injustice of becoming a member of parliament with less than 2,000 votes.
What happened to the DPS will happen to all other parties, Hadzhihasan is convinced, until politicians understand that new policies cannot be made with old faces.
With the new project, we are seeking change, first and foremost in the structure and functioning of the parties, explains Ismail Hadzhihasan.
The unknowns – why now and what next
The question remains as to why the Sevlievo municipal councilors from the DPS are joining the new civil movement at the end of 2025, just days after Ismail Hadzhihasan declared his support for Bulgarian MEP Ilhan Kyuchyuk on Facebook. He is one of Ahmed Dogan’s loyal politicians, and many suspected that Delian Peevski was behind the attack against him in December.
“I am a loyal person and I know how to wait,” Ismail Hadzhihasan explains. He made the decision to withdraw from Ahmed Dogan’s circle after learning that the new APS party charter would not include term limits. He had been waiting to hear this, and if the charter had limited the number of terms for deputies, municipal councilors, and mayors, he would not have joined the new movement. When this did not happen, his decision was final.
He is also adamant that he will not leave the DPS group in the Sevlievo Municipal Council, as his former party colleagues are urging him to do, Za Istinata learned from its sources.
Turkian Fountain – a symbol of resistance for human rights and freedoms
The new civil movement was established on December 21, 2025, at a place symbolic for Bulgarian Turks – the Turkian Fountain. This is where 18-month-old Turkyan and her aunt Aisha were killed on December 26, 1984. The fountain is located in the village of Mogilyane, Kardzhali region, and is a symbol of resistance and the struggle for human rights and freedoms in Bulgaria.
Nejmetin Hak, considered the father of the DPS and founder of the illegal resistance organization against the revival process, from which the DPS originated, spoke at the founding ceremony. According to media reports, when the DPS was created on January 4, 1990, Hak, who was the undisputed leader, resigned as party chairman, saying that “brother Ahmed” was more eloquent and ceded the chairmanship to Ahmed Dogan. Because of this incident, Nejmettin Hak is called “the discoverer of Dogan.”
In 2024, Nejmettin Hak declared that it was time for Ahmed Dogan to retire from politics, and a year later he became the founder of a formation that declared itself “without Dogan and without Peevski.”
“Well, what happened now? They stopped the development of our young people again,” says Nejmettin Hak in a video posted on Facebook by the founders of the new movement “Unification.” His words were prompted by the new APS charter, which once again ignores term limits, despite promises to set a limit on the length of time politicians can remain in power, in order to give young people who are unburdened by politics the opportunity to enter local and central government.
