The corruption scandal that led to the European Commission asking Bulgaria to suspend payment of EU funds for road infrastructure projects revealed serious gaps in Bulgaria’s witness protection legislation.

The scandal surrounding the National Road Infrastructure Fund (NRIF) developed on January 24 when police arrested two NRIF officials directly responsible for allocating EU funds.

In a police operation, Lyubomir Lilov, director of the EU Funds Absorption Directorate within the NRIF, and Ivan Vladimirov, director of preparation, tenders and contracting sector department, were allegedly caught with 25 000 leva in marked notes each. Police said that Lilov and Vladimirov had asked an architect for a 50 000 leva bribe in order to approve and expedite a project changing the status of agricultural land near Hemus Highway to enable construction.

The architect alerted the police and handed the money to the two NRIF officials. News of the arrests was widely advertised by Interior Ministry as a success against corruption in Bulgaria. Speaking to journalists on January 27, President Georgi Purvanov praised the operation.

The scandal added to the controversy around NRIF after, on January 11, NRIF head Vesselin Georgiev was alleged to be involved in a serious conflict of interest. After examining several company registration documents, Bulgarian-language Kapital weekly reported that the Binder company, headed by Georgiev’s brother Emil Georgiev, was among the biggest beneficiaries of NRIF money.

News about the NRIF reached the EC, and on January 25 Transport Minister Petar Moutafchiev said that the EC had asked Bulgaria to suspend payment of EU funds managed by the NRIF for road infrastructure projects. This meant that hundreds of millions of euro were “frozen” by the EC, putting on hold a number of infrastructure projects such as Transit Roads 3; the Lyulin Highway and the technical aid for the preparation of road sections of the Pan-European Road Network Programme. Also affected are two projects under the Operational Programme Transport, namely, the Kurdjali-Podkova (southern Bulgaria) section and the link between the Hemus Highway and Sofia’s ring road.

With all that money at stake, it was no surprise that police declined to disclose the name of the architect who had reported the corruption. However, his name was revealed a day later by the prosecutor’s office – hardly proper witness protection. Prosecutor Chavdar Angelov named Georgi Yanev as the architect who had alerted the police.
Speaking to commercial Nova Televisia on January 29, Yanev said that he believed that his life and the lives of his family were under threat because his name had been revealed.

“I was promised by the police that my name would be kept secret and now everybody knows that the person responsible for the suspension of more than billion of EU money is me – you tell me how I should feel now,” Yanev said. He said that police had treated him well and promised him full protection, but it was the prosecutor who broke the news and put him in danger.

In a phone call, Angelov told Nova Televisia that according to the law Yanev’s name could not be spared from being disclosed in court.

“Without Yanev’s name we could not charge Lilov and Vladimirov; there is no other way, because we cannot charge them with taking a bribe from an anonymous person,” Angelov said. He said that police and prosecutors had done their job by the book and said that no one from the police told him that Yanev wanted his name kept secret.

“I had to mention Yanev’s name in court, and why the court hearing did not happen behind closed doors, I don’t know. No one asked for this. However what is more worrying is that Yanev’s name was already circling in the media and both Lilov and Vladimirov knew it, after all, they were arrested minutes after Yanev gave them the money,” Angelov said.

From what Angelov said, it emerges that anyone who alerts the authorities about corruption or racketeering can be sure that their names will be revealed, which means that all that Bulgaria’s witness protection programme can do is concentrate on providing protection to a witness, without any secrecy about the identity of the witness. “This is what the law says,” Angelov said.

As for who the 50 000 leva was destined for, Yanev said: “I was told by Lilov that he was just a ‘mule’ in the sense that he was just a cog in the system”

Meanwhile the EC sent a strong signal to Bulgaria that it wanted serious action taken in the case. On January 28, EC spokesperson Marc Gray told Bulgarian news agency BTA that it did not matter whether the money involved was EU or Bulgarian funds; either way, an investigation was necessary.

“The charges are serious and the EC clearly stated it wants to suspend funding to the NRIF while the investigation is under way,” Gray said.

It was entirely up to Bulgaria to determine the duration of the suspension. The European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) had been notified about the case, Gray said.

On January 29, Interior Minister Petkov awarded a ceremonial dagger to Yanev for Yanev’s contribution to the fight against corruption.