/ world today news/ Two ministers – former principals of the “National Palace of Culture – Congress Center” AD – Tomislav Donchev and Liliana Pavlova, spoke at the hearing before the Temporary Commission in the National Assembly about open violations and bad practices in the management of the Palace so far. From their explanations, it was not clear why the management of the NDK was changed only now, after the problems in the management – doubts about the conduct of public procurement, lack of a business plan and a plan for the recovery of the company – have been going on for two years. The current Minister of Culture and new principal of NDK Boyle Banov also spoke before the commission, who in turn stated that Denitsa Zlateva released Miroslav Borshosh and the other two members of the board of directors from financial responsibility. She also accepted the financial report for 2016.
Tomislav Donchev, who had been principal for about a year and a half – until the end of the mandate of “Borisov 2”, began his presentation first. The Deputy Prime Minister admitted that for two years in a row the company has been at a loss of around BGN 9 million per year. The minister has asked several times from the former management of NDK a business plan for the development of the company, but such, according to him, has never been provided. “Four times in 2016, I demanded from the management a business plan with measures to stabilize the company. Such was not provided to me, only verbal explanations”, stated Donchev.
According to him, the management’s explanations given orally were not entirely satisfactory. In April 2016, there was an attempt by the company to start a repair order, but it was stopped because it was not in the terms of reference of the working group on preparations for the presidency. Donchev admitted that he had a dispute with the management of the NDK about which spaces in the Palace should be renovated and which should not.
“I was the principal of the company for about a year and a half. His priorities were the cultural activities of the NDK, the preparation for holding the presidency and to manage the company in a sustainable way,” Tomislav Donchev explained to the Temporary Commission. “It is an indisputable fact that the company was generating losses. For 2015 and 2016, it is within BGN 9.3 million. As a comment from the management, I have received an explanation that the loss is generated by depreciation and by the creation of new cultural spaces that would be related to the presidency. These are good investments, but I don’t see their connection with the Presidency,” the minister added.
Liliana Pavlova, who until recently was the principal and fired the executive director Miroslav Borshosh (he was reinstated at the insistence of Boyko Borisov, but later resigned himself), announced that numerous violations were found in the company in several areas according to requested inspections. Two of them have been completed – these are an external audit of the company and an inspection of the three public procurements carried out by the NDK – for construction and installation, for equipping the building for the needs of the Presidency and for construction control.
“The first group of problems that we identified in the NDK are related to the permanent tendency to realize losses. The financial statement for 2015 has not been certified, and the one for 2016 has been certified with a qualified opinion of the auditing firm. I asked for a business plan, measures to restore the company, but none were presented to me,” Liliana Pavlova explained at the hearing. “The second group of problems is related to public procurement. There are three procurements related to the Presidency. I asked for the rules for conducting public procurement, it turned out that they are missing,” Pavlova explained further.
“The report from the external audit firm is already ready. It has two components – public procurement and the repair of the National Palace of Culture. On the second component, there are no findings and recommendations due to the refusal of the NPC management to provide documentation. Violations were found in all three public procurements. The report was sent to ADFI. We have doubts about the illegality of the contracts concluded with the contractor (namely “Galchev Engineering” EOOD). However, they are a fact and the only thing we could do was to ask for them to come into effect,” said Pavlova.
“We established several worrying facts – delay in the repair, there was no project approved by the DAG for the main repair. There is also no final assignment of all actions to complete the repair. For seven months, activities had been carried out in the NDK without an appointed investor control. The activities were monitored only by NDK employees.
“On the ongoing renovation, it turned out that nothing was paid, except an advance upon its commencement. Despite my repeated insistence, I was not provided with a linear schedule with the terms of construction and installation works and how they will be combined with the cultural activities of the National Palace of Culture. None delay in the execution of the contract for sound equipment, but there was an annex (for BGN 1.8 million) for additional equipment for the press center. The project did not provide for the purchase of such equipment,” informed Pavlova.
“The executive director of the NDK, Miroslav Borshosh, requested BGN 36 million, but did not receive these funds. The reason was the opinion of the Public Procurement Agency that not all activities were necessary. We allocated BGN 28 million additionally, instead of the requested BGN 36 million Pavlova said.
As for the reason for the dismissal of the director of the NDK, Miroslav Boršos, Liliana Pavlova formulated it as follows: “I released Boršos because of his refusal to provide me with documentation, because of his refusal to perform his functions as an executive director, and because of the danger of delaying the renovation.”
According to the current Minister of Culture, Boil Banov, during the time when Denitsa Zlateva was principal, the costs of repairing the National Palace of Culture began to rise dramatically. During her time, an increase of BGN 4 million was obtained.
Denitsa Zlateva did not attend the hearing in the Temporary Committee, which caused a scandal at the beginning of its session and proposals to postpone it. “Even last week, I correctly informed the chairman of the temporary committee for the National National Committee, Mrs. Yordanova, that I will not be able to attend the meeting on July 11, due to my long-planned participation in a meeting of the Socialist International, which is being held in New York, USA. Once again, I express my readiness to assist the commission to establish all the facts surrounding the expenditure of the funds provided to the National National Committee for the preparation of the Bulgarian presidency in 2018”, wrote the deputy chairman of the BSP Denitsa Zlateva on Facebook, attaching her letter to Diana Yordanova from GERB.
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