{"id":43738,"date":"2018-11-22T19:29:37","date_gmt":"2018-11-22T17:29:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bivol.bg\/?p=43738"},"modified":"2018-11-24T17:14:47","modified_gmt":"2018-11-24T15:14:47","slug":"grave-institutional-failure-in-investigations-into-eu-funds-abuse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bivol.bg\/en\/grave-institutional-failure-in-investigations-into-eu-funds-abuse.html","title":{"rendered":"Grave Institutional Failure in Investigations into EU Funds Abuse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ignoring facts about serious corruption offenses, idling, delaying pre-trial proceedings, allowing irreversible destruction of evidence – such is the outcome of the actions of the Ministry of Interior (in particular the Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime, GDBOP<\/strong>) and the Prosecutor’s Office<\/strong> in the scandal known as \u201cGP Gate\u201d. Regardless of the \u201cactivities\u201d in the case, promoted by Prosecutor General Sotir Tsatsarov, and the pressed charges, obviously no one is working in depth to unravel the sinister by scale and dimensions corruption network associated with abuse of European Union (EU) funds, revealed by Bivol<\/strong>. The reluctance to do so is a sign that there is fear that people in power might be exposed. With its inactivity, the law enforcement agencies actually help offenders by providing them with the time and opportunity to cover up their tracks.<\/p>\n

Bivol was able to examine documents from the European institutions investigating the actions of the Bulgarian authorities in detecting abuse of EU funds, including \u201cGP Gate\u201d. The comparison with the publicly known facts raises many questions about the will and the capacity of the Bulgarian anti-corruption bodies.<\/p>\n

Minor part of the EU funds is being investigated for abuses<\/strong><\/p>\n

In general, law enforcement shows miserable results in investigations into theft of EU funds. This is particularly true for investigations related to the two major operational programs – “Transport<\/strong>” and “Regional Development<\/strong>” \u2013 as they involve a minuscule part of the amounts, a report for the period 2007 \u2013 2013 shows.<\/p>\n

For example, EUR 1,593,269,234.20 has been received from the Operational Program “Regional Development”<\/strong>, of which EUR 600,955.07 has been the subject of a national investigation or around 0.04%<\/strong> of the total amount.<\/p>\n

For the Operational Program “Transport”<\/strong>, there is no information of any prosecutorial actions, but the certifying authority has found irregularities in one project for EUR 168,519,60 or 0.01%<\/strong> of the EUR 1,593,269,234.20.<\/p>\n

The situation with the Operational Program “Competitiveness”<\/strong> is slightly better – EUR 955,912,449 has been received from it and the Bulgarian authorities have detected irregularities for EUR 1,979,232.52 euro or 0.2%<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

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Investigations into the Operational Program (OP) Regional Development<\/div><\/a>\"\"
Investigations into OP Transport<\/div><\/a>\"\"
Investigations into OP Competitiveness<\/div><\/a><\/div>\n

In comparison, only several of the projects<\/a> under the OP Competitiveness of the infamous Mario Nikolov<\/strong> amount to EUR 3.8. Exposed by the EU antifraud office OLAF of fraud and abuse of European funds, he was eventually acquitted by a Bulgarian court for misappropriation under the SAPARD program, while his accomplices in Germany served jail time for the same crimes. Such a double standard in the administration of justice reveals that the aforementioned projects of the scandalous businessman have never been investigated in substance in Bulgaria despite the well-founded suspicions. Mario Nikolov also became popular with the fact that he was one of the big donors in the presidential election campaigns of Georgi Parvanov.<\/p>\n

For the time being, there is no data on how many of the projects under the Rural Development Program (RDP) managed by the State Fund Agriculture (SFA) are being investigated for abuses.<\/p>\n

The Prosecutor\u2019s Office has ignored “GP Gate” until the scandal with the arrested journalists<\/strong><\/p>\n

On September 10, 2018, Bivol published the first part<\/a> of its journalistic investigation dubbed \u201cGP Gate\u201d, which exposed secret parallel bookkeeping by several consulting firms linked to the large construction company, GP Group. The documents published by Bivol revealed that impressive sums had been set aside to bribe mayors, government officials and experts.<\/p>\n

What followed was a sheer panic reaction on the part of the consultants, who on the very next day after the publication began \u201ccleaning up\u201d their offices in the building at 59 \u201cCherni Vruh\u201d Blvd. in the capital Sofia by removing and destroying documents and equipment that are potential evidence of serious corruption in the absorption of European funds. On September 11, Bivol forwarded in writing this insider information to the Prime Minister, the Prosecutor General and the Ministry of Interior (MoI). Prime Minister Boyko Borisov straightaway ordered the MoI to conduct a probe.<\/p>\n

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The signal to the Prime Minister, the Prosecutor General and the MoI, submitted around 3 pm on September 11, 2018<\/p><\/div>\n

The Prosecutor’s Office, however, pretended that it had not received such a signal. The latter was officially filed only on September 14<\/strong>, along with a signal sent by Deputy Prime Minister Tomislav Donchev<\/strong>. The two letters have been merged into one case which has been forwarded to the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office. There, the case has been filed under number 18677\/2018<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

This and other facts emerge from documents gathered by Brussels in connection with the investigations of the Bulgarian authorities, which Bivol has examined.<\/p>\n

On September 14, however, leading international media had already published front page news of two journalists arrested in Bulgaria on September 13 while investigating misappropriation of EU funds. So, it appears that the Prosecutor’s Office has become active because of the international interest and not because of the specific crimes outlined in the publication.<\/p>\n

The delayed reaction of the prosecution exposes the inactivity of the MoI as well. The GDPOB, which started the investigation on the orders of Prime Minister Borisov and on September 12 had already talked with journalists of Bivol, received reliable information about the ongoing removal of documents from the GP offices and their destruction. We can only guess the reasons why the anti-mafia police chose to do nothing. It is also a fact that it did not inform the Prosecutor’s Office in due time. Moreover, instead of apprehending the perpetrators of a likely monstrous theft, the police arrested and kept handcuffed all night long the reporter of Bivol Dimitar Stoyanov and our Romanian colleague Attila Biro. It happened at the crime scene to where the journalists had traveled to verify the facts. Instead of helping our team, the police did their best to prevent them from doing their job. In the aftermath, the GDBOP boss, Ivaylo Spiridonov, blatantly refused during a TV broadcast to even apologize to Bivol.<\/p>\n

After the signal had been eventually “filed” on September 14, three days later, on September 17, Tsatsarov’s office deigned to tell the protesters outside that a probe had been launched and assigned to the National Security Agency (DANS)<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The probes had been advancing very slowly, despite the second publication about GP Group (see here<\/a>), which lists the names of government officials and politicians who have received the so-called \u201ccommissions\u201d i.e. bribes. We recall that Prime Minister Borisov ordered to have them suspended from their posts until the outcome of the probe is known.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Only on October 8, in the whirl of public tension after the murder of journalist Victoria Marinova, the Sofia City Prosecutor’s Office did initiate pre-trial proceedings for the following crimes:<\/strong><\/p>\n