After the hearing of Mayor Vasil Terziev in the Sofia Municipal Council, it became clear that despite the unprecedentedly favorable political situation, the Sofia Municipality administration is not offering a clear and concrete plan for dealing with the garbage crisis. This was stated by the chairman of Spasi Sofia, Boris Bonev.
“The mayor is in an extremely advantageous situation, in which whatever he asks from the Sofia Municipal Council, he will be given, because there is no party that will sign his death warrant, forcing Sofia residents to live buried in garbage”, said Bonev and added that the problem is that Terziev does not say what exactly he needs. “What resources, what equipment, how many people - he does not say. Instead of saying “I want the Sofia Municipal Council to adopt this and that decision in order to get Sofia residents out of the crisis” we encounter silence and unwillingness for dialogue. The last concrete measure that he finally introduced after our insistence was an increase in the number of employees at the Garbage Plant. That was more than a month ago and since then - nothing“, Bonev emphasized.
According to him, the hearing did not provide an answer to the main questions that concern citizens and for which the municipal councilors owe answers to the city, the party's press center informed.
„And today Terziev did not present specifics and documents were hidden from us again. The behavior of both the administration and the mayor continues to look like the behavior of people without a plan“, Bonev stated.
According to Spasi Sofia, it was demonstrated to the citizens and the media that the municipality reacts chaotically and puts out fires, instead of managing the processes strategically.
According to Spasi Sofia, in the five districts that the municipality is cleaning, the situation is getting out of control. „Therefore, we repeat our request that Terziev declare a state of emergency – not as an end in itself, but in order to have free hands and be able to engage more resources, equipment and people. This will give his administration time to better organize the municipal capacity“, Bonev pointed out.
The party emphasized that the Sofia Municipal Council must support their proposal to exempt citizens from the garbage fee for the period in which the service was not actually provided. “Nearly 400,000 Sofia residents received minimal to no service. This must be recognized and they must be compensated, just as the compensation for holders of public transport cards was created after the so-called strike, again at our proposal,“, said the chairman of Spasi Sofia.
“We stated that the mayor can count on our support to deal with the crisis, but it is not expressed in patient silence, while every week he explains that “next week” "Everything will be fine. We will support him for everything he asks, as long as he takes responsibility and governs - with a clear plan and with the transparency that we talked about together before the elections," Bonev concluded.