The Joint Management Council (JMC) of the ruling coalition is meeting today to discuss the state budget for 2025, BTA reports.
In general, we have information about what the numbers look like, today we will confirm it finally, commented Stanislav Balabanov from "Ima takvi narod" (ITN) to journalists upon entering the parliament building. The hole in the budget is huge and here some people who collapsed the state just a few months ago with the budgets they adopted, I mean Assen Vassilev, have no right to give assessments, let alone give advice, he commented. We are gathering here for another council, a coalition council, to see if there is a mechanism to deal with these challenges, Balabanov added.
"This year will perhaps be shaped more as a transitional one, so that we can tighten our belts and have an eye on the eurozone when we are ready", the MP from the ITN commented.
When asked about the state's money and infrastructure projects, Nikolay Nankov (GERB-SDF) commented that there will be a Joint Management Council on the topic shortly. What we have known since last year is that there are over 500 million leva unpaid under the municipal program, he pointed out. As early as February 2024 We warned that the money in the budget would not be enough for the municipal program and that the mayors should not dig up the cities, because they would face a very serious case, Nankov said. The indexations, for which agreements have been concluded since the beginning of 2024 in the "Road Infrastructure" Agency, are for over 400 million leva, again unpaid, he added.
Last week, the partners in the government also discussed the state of public finances and the parameters of the budget for this year. On Saturday, GERB leader Boyko Borisov requested at the beginning of this week and before the Joint Management Council that the Ministry of Finance and Minister Petkova answer him what and in what amount the expenses due for 2024 have been delayed and transferred to 2025, in order to meet the set deficit on a cash basis. He wrote this on Facebook after a meeting with mayors and chairmen of municipal councils from the Veliko Tarnovo region.