The strike of public transport workers in Sofia continues for a third day. Three things have become clear in these three days. 
First – the industrial strength of the transport workers. They have shown that, when organised, they can paralyse the capital and put the government into emergency mode. 
Second – solidarity. Many ordinary people and workers from other sectors supported the strikers. The miners from TPP Maritsa East also organised a protest in solidarity with the transport workers.
And third – the ugly face of the anti-social and anti-worker Sofia Liberal Right was revealed in all its glory.
From the first day of the strike, the entire smug metropolitan “middle class”, led by its media vanguard in the face of Dnevnik, OffNews, Boulevard Bulgaria, etc. began to spew scum, conspiracy theories and outright lies against the workers. In their panic, the city liberals went off in all directions – first they babbled that the strike wouldn’t affect traffic and everything was business as usual, then they started complaining that the capital was under siege and that the “real Sofians” were being held captive by a handful of workers. When they got fed, up they switched to their tried and tested tactic of setting the workers against each other. The media office-holders began reprinting polls on how fair their readers thought the transport workers’ wages were (backed up with fake figures) and tearful stories of “white collar” workers who received a moral shock at the thought that manual workers would have the temerity to demand close to their pay.

 Mayor Terziev announced that providing salaries for transport workers would stop the construction of kindergartens. 
On the second day of the strike, liberal thought finally managed to come up with a solid conspiracy theory around which to rally – the aforementioned media began to blow up in one voice that the strike was organized by GERB and BSP to punish their mayor. The tone was quickly set by all sorts of empty-headed and empty-handed people eager for conspiracy theories, with the workers even being accused of organising the strike to stop the anti-euro Revival meeting in the National Palace of Culture. 
In fact, discontent in Sofia public transport has been building up for years. For anyone following the situation closely, this strike is not just not unexpected, it is even overdue. As much as the self-righteous liberals don’t like to be believed, the world does not revolve around their mayor.


In order to counter the attempts of the liberal elite in Sofia to create division among the workers and to set society against the strike, we must show solidarity with the strikers. The support of workers in other sectors is crucial. We have already seen support from miners and some medical workers. It is time for other sectors to join in, especially those who are currently fighting the same struggle – journalists from BNT and BNR, medical professionals from SBMS, etc. 
Connecting these struggles will increase their industrial strength and help each of them individually. 
 The other thing the Liberals don’t understand, or at least don’t want their electorate to understand, is the role of the unions. It is abundantly clear to anyone even vaguely familiar with trade unionism in Bulgaria that the last thing union headquarters wants is effective strike action. For them to do so means only one thing – that the transport workers are so determined on industrial action that if the unions had not led the strike, they would have organised it without them. The union bosses prefer administrative unionism – negotiation, participation in committees and table bargaining. There is their strength. Conversely, the power of the workers is on the picket line. There decisions are made by all and solidarity and militancy prevail over union compromise and commitment. 

At the moment, the union headquarters of the two big unions are united and support the workers’ hard line.
 The danger to the success of the strike will come not from the complaining and ranting of the liberals, but if one of the headquarters (or both) try to negotiate an end to the strike behind the backs of the workers. It is up to the workers to withstand all attacks, from without and within.
It is up to all of us working in other sectors to show solidarity and block the government’s attempts to stir up division and hatred.