Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev stated that the second payment to our country under the Recovery and Resilience Plan will be possible this year if the remaining 15% reforms related to it are carried out.
Donchev made a special statement after announcing earlier today that Bulgaria will not receive a second payment of 653 million euros under the PVP due to unfulfilled reforms:
"After we are officially notified by letter that what has been done so far is insufficient, which will happen literally within days, we have a 6-month period in which we could and will try to make all the reforms from scratch. That is, those laws that have not been adopted or have not been adopted in the form that the EC expects, should be approved by the National Assembly. For me, this is an absolutely realistic deadline - by the end of July. I have the ambition, I hope to receive support from the national representatives, what has not been completed - it is small, it is 15%, as I said, 85% of the reforms have been made - to pass through the National Assembly. Then we may receive a larger part, and in the ideal case - even the entire second payment. I said what worries me - the liberalization of the electricity market.
The Deputy Prime Minister confirmed his thesis from the morning that 50% of the projects under the PVU are at risk because they have not started and it is impossible for them to be completed by August next year.
To the criticism from the PP-DB that the cabinet does not want to advance the judicial reform and that is why the money under the Plan is in question, Donchev replied:
"Any speculation on the topic is absolutely inappropriate, including on the topic of "Corruption". The Anti-Corruption Law was adopted in the hall with the votes of GERB. Of course, there is still work to be done. The fight against corruption is very important, but we cannot reduce the entire complex world to the fight against corruption.".