/ world today news/ The economic damage from Bulgaria’s non-admission to Schengen is over 180 million per year. Even more serious, however, are the political ones, which reinforce Euroscepticism among Bulgarian citizens. This was commented by the head of the Delegation of the Bulgarian Socialists in the EP, Petar Vitanov, to “Your Day” on Nova News.
“Schengen is above all the implementation of technical criteria, which we have long covered. This has been declared by both the European Parliament and the European Commission. The most important topic is not so much the political arguments of Austria and the Netherlands, but the interests of the Bulgarian citizens. The discrimination is that we meet all the requirements but are excluded from the benefits. The economic damage is estimated at more than 180 million per year – due to waiting for days at the borders, goods spoiling and this increasing the overall cost of transport. Environmental damage is 46,000 tons of exhaust gases per year along our borders. But the worst are the political damages, those that create anti-European sentiments. Therefore, the rapid integration of Bulgaria is extremely important. I hope the issue will be resolved soon, especially since the Schengen topic was used to make this unpopular governing coalition,” said Petar Vitanov.
According to Petar Vitanov, the rule of law is an important topic for Brussels, but even more important for Bulgarian citizens.
“Until now, the judicial reform looks like “Ilya changed, looked at himself – again in this way”. We saw what kind of vaudeville the sessions of the SJC were. In order to refute me, the rulers from the “non-coalition” must unblock the procedure for electing a new Supreme Judicial Council,” said the MEP.
“It is cynical that politicians who built their careers on the backs of Peevski and Borisov are now sitting at the same table with them, and this should seem normal to us. Political dialogue is necessary, but not in the conditions of such a double standard. It is better to sit down and talk honestly and respectfully with the voters than to cast spells and then do the exact opposite,” Petar Vitanov is emphatic.
The socialist also commented on the negative feedback about the processes in our country.
“Europe is not a cop or a class, we are part of it. But there were also objective reasons why we did not look good in the eyes of our European partners – we are in last place in all rankings, we did not have a sustainable government for two years, we have problems related to fundamental issues such as the way state administration functions, the rule of law and human rights. The lack of real separation of powers was also distrust among our partners,” reported Vitanov.
He also explained why there is a risk of losing some of the money under the Recovery and Resilience Plan.
“The renegotiation of the Plan was the height of populism, because the Bulgarian parliament broadcast only wishful but unfeasible messages to Brussels. The goals of the Plan cannot be changed, small adjustments can probably be made, but nothing more,” commented the MEP.
According to Petar Vitanov, the responsibility now falls on the cabinet.
“There is a new regular government, a parliament, and 17-18 laws that can be passed to unblock the process so that the WFP money goes to our country. The biggest problem is that there was a lack of a strategic vision of how to make the transformation of energy sources,” he added.
“Europe is waving like a scarecrow, we created it for ourselves to justify management weakness. But we have to realize that the EU has changed Romania, the Czech Republic, the other countries of the former Eastern bloc. There are visible results of how European funds can be managed. In our country, we had ineffective management for years,” concluded Vitanov.
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