Comment by Emilia Milcheva:
If the Ministry of Interior has announced a public procurement for 30,000 icons, then it must announce a new one for their consecration - because an icon is such when it is painted according to the church canon, created with the consciousness of holiness and consecrated by a clergyman. In some churches, such a service is paid "as much as you give", in others there is a price list, and for convenience, a priest can consecrate the entire public procurement. Because otherwise the so-called. icons "with a size of 4 cm to 5 cm from unbreakable material" with the possibility of sticking are actually ordinary stickers.
Absurd content - and many times overpriced
Media and social networks had fun with the order, which was first reported by the website of "Kapital". For 420,000 leva, the Ministry of Interior is seeking supplies of 30,000 icons and as many yellow bags, 15,000 beach balls, 50,000 balloons, 30,000 blue pens, 1,000 badges, 1,540 puzzles, as well as 3,000 figures for illustration. These items are intended for the "National Preventive Campaign for Children in the Field of Road Safety", which is financed by the Road Safety Fund. The Ministry of Interior, as the contracting authority, will choose whose image the icons will have - Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary with the baby, Saint Christopher, who protects from mishaps on the road, or another saint.
The value of the order seems inflated - the icons will not be painted, and given the announced quantities, the balloons, pens, balls, badges should cost a few cents per unit. For example, on Merkandi, an international B2B (business-to-business) platform, the price of a balloon is 0.013 euros (about 0.025 leva) per piece excluding VAT, and includes packages of 100 balloons with a diameter of 13 cm, made of rubber. The minimum order is 400 packages (i.e. 40,000 balloons), and 500 packages will cost the trader from Bulgaria, who would order them, 1,250 leva (639 euros). Even in larger sizes, balloons will hardly exceed 2000 leva. For balls, prices range from 25 cents per item from Chinese suppliers to 1.80 euros from European ones, but with lower transportation costs and faster delivery.
If we assume that the balls, bags, balloons and badges can be used for a prize pool - although bicycle helmets, crayons and drawing pads or tablets would do a better job, then what would the sticker icons be used for? They could hand them out in virtue and religion classes, as long as they integrate road safety education into them.
420,000 seems too high a price for the advertised items. Unless this value contains hidden "components", invisible to the taxpayers, whose money is being managed by the officials from the Ministry of Interior.
Who "identifies" the need for icons
Because of the absurd order, the Minister of Interior Daniel Mitov has demoted the Deputy Director of the General Directorate "National Police" Kaloyan Miltenov to Deputy Head of the Operational Duty Center. But this sanction cannot replace an internal check that gets to the bottom (or at least to the mud that covers it).
The path of a public procurement, before being published in the register, begins with a structure within the department that establishes the need for the specific service or delivery - regardless of whether it is extruded food for police dogs, police uniforms such as suits, summer jackets, jackets, or cars.
The Ministry of the Interior is the largest public procurement authority for cars, the last of which was for 462 motor vehicles (35 high-speed, 200 passenger and 227 off-road) for over 150 million leva from the Road Safety Fund. From 2021 to November 30, 2024, over 352 million leva were collected in the Fund, which is filled with funds from fines recorded by speed cameras, donations, etc. But the Ministry of Interior does not publicly announce what it spends the funds on, unless it receives a request from a member of parliament.
After the "Public Procurement" Directorate at the Ministry of Interior was closed in 2019, its functions were taken over by the "Property Management and Social Activities" Directorate. Someone in this directorate suggested, and the superiors confirmed, that icon stickers would help with road safety and reduce road injuries. This absurdity has gone through several levels of approval, received signatures and seals, but the public has every right to know how this decision was argued and who the persons responsible are. Tomorrow, someone else in the Ministry of Interior may propose a public procurement for amulets against bad karma…
And the training might be interesting
If officials wanted to do their job well, they would study the good European examples of road safety education for children. That way they would understand that icons, bags and pens have no place. Instead, digital applications and VR (virtual reality) are successfully used, which simulate road conditions and teach children to make the right decisions. In addition, they ride bicycles in a simulated street environment with road signs and signals. And to make the training more fun, videos, puppet shows, and practical tests are used.
But the Ministry of Interior is not particularly inventive, although for 2024 Bulgaria is in second place after Romania in terms of deaths in car accidents with 74 people per million. Like parties, Bulgarian institutions are formatted into interest groups. And the children will cross the pedestrian crossings with bags with "icons" stuck on them, because apparently there is no one else to protect them from a drunk or drugged driver, sweeping up everyone in his path.