Regional Minister Ivan Shishkov will disband the entire "Public Procurement" Directorate in the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Works, BNR and Sega newspaper reported.
The Directorate will no longer exist, and its functions will be taken over by the "Legal" Directorate.
A total of 39 positions are being cut in the MRDPW, which constitutes 6% of the staff.
The changes in the regulations of the regional ministry are motivated by the need for better regulation of the activities of individual directorates, as well as the 10% reduction in personnel costs set in the draft budget for 2026.
Currently, the "Public Procurement" Directorate of the MRDPW has 15 positions. The department is not such a large order-giver, although billions are paid under its umbrella - both under the "Regional Development" program and under the roads.
In the case of roads, the order-giver is the "Road Infrastructure" Agency, and in the regional program most orders are announced by the beneficiaries themselves.
The reasons for the proposed changes state that the "Public Procurement" Directorate overlaps as an activity with the functions of the "Legal" Directorate and the existence of two separate structures only complicates and delays coordination and work on procedures. For the purpose of better organization, the two directorates are merging into one and instead of 41 staff positions for these functions, 35 remain, or an optimization with 6 staff positions.
It is not clear whether this approach - merging the "Legal" Directorate and the "Public Procurement" Directorate, will be adopted by other ministries.
The staff of the MRDPW is reduced from 627 to 588. The cut in the minister's political office is only by one staff - from 13 to 12, with the number of advisors in it becoming 7 instead of 8. The general administration is reduced from 146 to 128, the specialized - from 443 to 424.