Bulgaria’s PM Criticized the Caretaker Government for a Series of Problems including Missing Funds

From the delay of reforms under the European plan for recovery and sustainability, through the organization for helicopters and emergency air assistance, the takeover of the Plovdiv fair by the businessman Georgi Gergov, problems in the State Consolidation Company and the repairs of dams, to an unfavorable contract with the Turkish "Botas" for gas supplies. These are some of the highlights of the summary of Prime Minister Academician Nikolay Denkov with criticisms of the administration of the caretaker government.

The Prime Minister announced that he is making this assessment after sixty days of work of the "Denkov-Gabriel" cabinet, after his management program with five priorities was recently distributed to the media. "During the preparation of the program, we encountered various problems. From the first day, we had to put out fires in most of the ministries," said Nikolay Denkov. The ministers of finance (Asen Vassilev), economy and industry (Bogdan Bogdanov), energy (Rumen Radev), transport (Georgi Gvozdeikov) and regional development (Andrei Tsekov) also spoke at the press conference about the "fires" in the ministries.

The positive assessment of the Prime Minister was given only to the former Minister of Justice (now the President's Secretary for Legal Affairs) Krum Zarkov for the preparation of numerous laws with reforms on the European plan and the promotion of the issue of building a National Children's Hospital.

The caretaker government received the most criticism because of the delay in measures under the second tranche of the European plan for recovery and sustainability, under which Bulgaria is scheduled to receive 1.4 billion leva.

According to the plan, the reforms for the second tranche were supposed to be completed by the end of last year, but at the moment only half of them (33 out of 66) have been reported as completed. A large part of the measures are legislative, which were delayed not because of the caretaker government, but because of a parliament that either did not work or could not find agreement on them.

However, it is also a fact that some of the bills - in the portfolio of the former Minister of Energy Rosen Hristov - were not prepared at all.

Today (August 3), the Minister of Finance Asen Vassilev announced that the energy laws have been developed and published for public discussion.

According to Vassilev, the government's expectations are that by the end of September, all laws will be adopted according to the European plan. If this happens, Bulgaria could submit a request to receive a tranche of 1.4 billion leva and the funds would be available by the end of the year, according to the Minister of Finance.

Prime Minister Nikolay Denkov announced that the government is at the starting point for the provision of emergency air assistance. The exchange of accusations on the subject dates back to a long time ago: from the "Petkov" cabinet and the subsequent offices of President Rumen Radev.

In the previous regular government, with Prime Minister Kiril Petkov, Georgi Gvozdeikov headed the "Bulgaria Helimed Services" company created for Air Emergency Assistance. However, the caretaker government has transferred the work of providing the medical helicopters to the State Aviation Operator.

"There is a European regulation that requires this activity to be carried out by commercial companies. What the caretaker government did was to close the commercial company and transfer the activity to the State Aviation Operator, which does not have the right to carry out this activity," Denkov summarized and pointed out, that the company will be re-established.

According to him, the move of the caretaker government was also incorrect, the sites where the helicopters were to stay: "They cannot be in the hospitals, as was initiated. They have no right. They can only land there when there is a need to carry out the relevant medical activity" said the Prime Minister.

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