“The idea of the so-called “second prosecutor's office“, as the Anti-Corruption Commission was often called, has completely crashed. We have a prosecutor's office, investigative services and security agencies. If they do not work according to the law, the solution is not to create new structures, but to impose legality“, said in the studio of “Offensive with Lyubo Ognyanov“ the former director of the NSBOP, General Rumen Milanov.
Milanov recalled that the Commission was initially created for the purpose of confiscating illegally acquired property – a form of civil confiscation, close to criminal. Subsequently, functions on conflict of interest and corruption were added to it by merging units from the Ministry of Interior, the State Agency for National Security and the Court of Accounts.
„This resulted in an overly bloated structure without clear logic. The persistent insistence that it have investigative functions was a mistake“, he said, adding that the model was highly personalized and tied to specific names and political agreements.
As an additional mistake, the expert identified the binding of the anti-corruption commission to payments under the Recovery and Resilience Plan. According to him, this created a formal, rather than a real anti-corruption mechanism.
„This was more of a facade – to show that something is being done without solving the problem in essence“, he commented.
Regarding the proposal to distribute the functions of the commission between the National Audit Office, the Directorate General of the State Audit Office and the National Security Agency, Milanov said that he did not see a problem with this. “The issue is coordination, not the creation of a new commission of 20 or 200 people“, he said.
Milanov also commented on the topic of the security of MPs. According to him, when there is a real threat, protection should be provided by the National Security Service, not by the Ministry of Internal Affairs.
In conclusion, he also commented on the topic of the use of personal cars by heads of state. “From a security point of view, this is frivolous. The National Security Service cars are technically checked and secured. The law clearly regulates the rights of presidents“, he emphasized.