The Deputy Mayor of Sofia Municipality Ivan Vassilev announced that he had informed Mayor Vasil Terziev of his desire to leave the post. “I have personally informed the Mayor of Sofia about my reasons. I will remain in office until the case related to the change of the municipality's servicing bank is resolved“, explained Vassilev. Ivan Vassilev announced his decision days after it became clear that Municipal Bank itself had requested to unilaterally terminate its relations with Sofia Municipality, as it does not want to be involved in political discussions. Who does what in Sofia Municipality… Ivan Takov, chairman of the group of the Local Coalition "BSP for Bulgaria", speaks to FACTI in SOS.
- Mr. Takov, what is happening in Sofia Municipality. One deputy mayor is in custody, another is leaving…
- Nothing can surprise me anymore in the leadership of Sofia Municipality. Mayor Terziev's request from two years ago that he has a ready-made team that will work in a different way turned out to be a mirage. We see that Mayor Terziev not only does not have a ready-made team, but the people in his team have also changed several times. If you follow what is happening in recent months, you see that now Sofia Municipality is practically left without deputy mayors in key departments such as finance and healthcare, construction, transport, European programs, etc. For me, Terziev's work is total amateurism and a complete lack of capacity - both managerial and administrative. It is evident that they are not keeping up with the commitments made during the election campaign.
- And now we are witnessing yet another scandal surrounding Ivan Vassilev and the change of the servicing bank of Sofia Municipality?
- This is one of the burning issues at the moment. But I must say something very clearly -
the decision with which bank Sofia Municipality will work is entirely within the powers of Mayor Vasil Terziev. He himself can decide where to keep the municipality's money - in which bank, under what conditions, etc.
I repeat - this decision is within the powers of the mayor, without having to go through the Municipal Council. You know, over the past year we have witnessed a real paradox - Vasil Terziev and his deputy Ivan Vassilev did not implement many decisions of the Municipal Council that were taken in due order. And at the same time, decisions that are within the powers of the mayor and are not within the competence of the Municipal Council were and continue to be transferred to the Municipal Council. This shows true managerial weakness.
- Why does Vasil Terziev, since he can decide for himself which bank to serve the municipality, bring it into the Municipal Council. Is he looking for support, looking for security for him or...
- You should ask him that. But I say again that this decision about which bank the municipality will work with is not within the competence of the Municipal Council. Of course, the Municipal Council can make a decision on any issues, including this one, but that's not the point. The mayor does not implement mandatory decisions of the Municipal Council, but brings in cases for consideration that are entirely within his competence. I give an example of what Mayor Terziev does not implement. There is a decision of the Municipal Council to allocate 15 million to public transport, and this is not happening. This decision is mandatory for implementation, but he does not implement it. This shows the mentality, the way of working and the lack of political culture on the part of the mayor and his administration.
- In the Municipal Council itself, how is Mayor Terziev's move viewed, because there is already a misunderstanding within the coalition "We Continue the Change - Democratic Bulgaria" itself...
- If you have carefully followed what happened in the case of the change of the servicing bank, you know that the report was postponed at the suggestion of a municipal councilor from "We Continue the Change" and was not included in the agenda of the last session of the Municipal Council at all. It is evident that even in their coalition they do not agree on the issue. The justification of the colleague from the PP was precisely that this decision is not within the competence of the Municipal Council. And the report itself was written in an absolutely vulgar and amateurish manner.
- Where is the work of the Municipal Council going then? Will there be a strike by the people who handle the garbage in Sofia?
- You raise another major topic that the BSP group has been alarming about for a year now - namely the situation with the cleaning of Sofia.
You know that in May the contracts of all the companies expired and at the moment we do not know how they were extended and for how long.
Here again this is only within the competence of the mayor. Terziev should have started a new procedure for selecting companies a long time ago, because we constantly hear from him that he is not satisfied with the current cleaning of Sofia and has fined the companies.
At the same time, for this year he has given them another 220 million to these - the same companies that he is allegedly dissatisfied with.
Without them having won any competitions. Most likely, this is done through the extension of existing contracts.
- And why is this not being talked about?
- Apparently this is the new way of governing Sofia, which was discussed during the election campaign. But let me pay attention to the transport companies here. I hope that there will be no more strikes, since the funds for salaries will be provided. However, the problem lies elsewhere. As you know, CGM is the company that distributes funds to the transport companies.
Unfortunately, CGM does not receive regular funds from the state.
Of course, they have enough income, but in terms of cash flow, in terms of liquidity, holes sometimes open up for them. For this reason, at the last session of the season, the BSP group submitted a report on financing the CGM with 22 million leva. This way, the Center for Urban Mobility would pay off the transport companies. We wanted to allocate funds to them precisely during this summer period - by September, October, so that they could work.
And at the end of the year, the funds will come from the state and then the CGM will return these 22 million to the Sofia Municipality.
At the session of the Municipal Council, this report was rejected and caused a storm of joy from the councilors from "Save Sofia", which was completely inexplicable to me. This is like being happy when you score an own goal in the most important match... By boycotting this report, the PP-DB and "Save Sofia" put the entire transport system in the city at risk. That's why I'm signaling now that there is a danger of a halt in the supply of spare parts, there are indications that fuel supplies may be cut off, etc. This is how the municipality works…