Published in “The Dnevnik” daily, 07 July 2010 (a resume)
Every law graduate knows well that the right of ownership is built up by three powers: to dispose, to possess and to use. By various contracts one could transfer for a certain time the use or the possession to third parties but he still retains the ownership. To dispose is the heart of ownership- it cannot be conceded but can only be transplanted and thus the donor body ceases legally to exist as owner.
The right of disposal is the soul of property because it embodies its implied freedom- there is no free man without the right of sacred and inviolable property. If according to Rudolph von Jhering possession is the front guard of ownership, disposal is its temple.
The intolerance of rulers to individual freedom is always focused against the disposal of property because it is the fundament of personal freedom. Since it is politically impossible to challenge ownership as such, its “deactivation” always starts with restricting the freedom of disposal and subjecting it to another’s will. Communism gave numerous examples.
A metastasis of the same cancer thinking is the current lobbyists’ drive to oblige the owner of farming land to offer it for sale first to its lessee- i.e. the right of first refusal for the farming tenant. The tears for this lessee’s right are of crocodile nature. Price is not the only motivation for a land sale. I my have personal criteria to give it to a person with a lower bid. This is my personal freedom and privacy. More so is this valid in case of a donation. Should I first donate the lessee?
The right of first refusal for buying an object exists already in art. 33 of Property law- when a co-owner sells his share of the common object he must offer it to the other co-owner and if the latter does not accept the price then the seller can go to third parties. The same is being designed for the farming land in regard to the lessee. But please note the impudence- in this way they upgrade the lessee to a co-owner of yours! The lessee is already sitting at your table and you must conform to him as a co-owner.
The allegation that the farming land should be bought out by those who farm it is a reflection of the scarce resources for psychiatric aid in Bulgaria. I am farming the land because I have let the lessee in and he is doing it on my instruction and behalf. I can change him but he cannot change me. Otherwise it is just one step from the conclusion that homes should belong to those who live in them- the tenants. And the women?
If this lobbyists’ bill gets passed it will be the end of free disposal of farming land and we jump back to the early years of communist farming land collectivization. Because if you ask the lessee to pay 100 but he wants to pay just 50, you try to sell it to a third party at 100. But the lessee will have the right to start a case against you for establishing a fictional price (he would claim you sold for 40 and 60 were kicked back in cash). Just the pending of such a case gives the lessee the right to free the land and the deal till you and your third party buyer are exhausted and give up the transaction. This will be a taming lesson for other owners from the same field.
It is all about turning the big lessees’ farming funds into huge farming land owners at a funny price. Just check them by trying to impose a 10 year ban on their resale of such land after buying it this way. You will here a hostile beast roaring.
Someone should explain to me why my personal freedom of land disposal should be sacrificed at the altar of EU funds and not some personal property of this bill’s sponsors and of the lobbying minister? If this government wants a faring land consolidation let it achieve it through decent economic means which fit a democracy with a market economy. But if the government disregards the small far land owners they will revenge on it in their hundreds of thousands at the next elections. And that will be a pity because this is not the worst government after 1989.
But finally I want to ask something my honorable colleagues from the so called big law firms: Why are you big in your silence when the small man is being kicked in front of you? Because the kickers pay bigger fees?
June 2010
Valentin Braykov
P.S. To the credit of the Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borissov he withdrew the above criticized bill in the third week of July 2010.