On the free audit and the free lunch

Four of the five big auditing companies answered the appeal of Economy Minister Nikolai Vassilev for help in the audit of the long-ago privatized Gorubso-Madan mining complex. The desire of the companies to give gratuitous help to the state, which does not have the necessary budget to pay for these services, is more than admirable.

This appeal, though, demonstrates the serious problem that is already hanging over the heads of the new ministers. As Vassilev said, there is no one in the state administration who knows the real condition of the troubled Gorubso-Madan, even if the fate of a whole town and region depends on it. Most probably, the situation would be the same if a hunger strike started tomorrow in Plama, Vidachim, Agrobiochim, Bulgargeomin, the Varna shipyard, the workers in the Russian construction sites, and many, many others who expect help from the state for the deadlock in which they have ended up.

The mode of work of the Western financial and consultant firms proved to be in a counterbalance with that of Bulgaria's state administration. The new ministers need either to reorganize the ministries to function at least partly with higher standards, or to use outside help for each more significant problem. The alternative, though used for free, could easily put the new ruling party in an endless series of friendly gestures from and to well-wishing consultants, assistants and aides for whom it is well known that a huge part of business depends on the connections with the Cabinet circles. Thus, in the end, it could turn out that the proposed free credit might be put in the product list of the free lunch and the free cheese in the trap.
-Kapital

The pensions triangle

The Minister of Labour and Social Policy, Lidia Shuleva, announced yesterday that there is a black market for labour in Bulgaria and the money for pensions is not enough. Like a number of other problems, this is a closed circle. It is drama-laden just like the love one, because human passions are raging, and it is dark like the Bermuda triangle, where not ships, but money sinks.

If the cash-box is to be filled, from which the National Insurance Institute will get the money for the pensions of our moms and dads, the social security payments need to be made. For those to be made, the gray economy needs to come out into the light. For this to happen, the state will have to lose some sweat. The business which secures jobs also needs its noose to be loosened a bit, so that it would invest and insure the workers at real wages, and not the minimum ones. And the labour inspection should get busy and punish foreigners dooming hundreds of women to medieval drudgery in tailor's workshops.
-Trud

The calendar of achievements took a great toll on human life

The former government bequeathed to us not only the calendar of achievements but also ruined roads. Again and again they take a great toll on human life - more than in Kosovo and Macedonia. It is not true that Bulgarians are careless drivers and that this was, reportedly, the reason they die on the roads. There are foreigners among the victims, too. Even motor racing driver Christian Fittipaldi could not avoid all the holes and pits on the roads. Not to mention the discouraging markings.

It's been revealed that an Italian firm, close to former Minister of Regional Development Evgeni Chachev, invests money in filling the holes rather than building new highways. That turned out to be more profitable. The new minister, Kostadin Paskalev, was smart enough to order a checkup. But it will not bring back the victims of road accidents.
-Standart

It is time that Vassilev learned diplomacy

Minister of Economy Nikolai Vassilev made his first blunder since he took over the responsible state post. On his first visit to Turkey, where he and his delegation were distinguished guests of the international fair in Izmir, Vassilev forgot all about good manners and respect for his hosts. It is unacceptable for a Bulgarian statesman of such a high rank to make any kind of comment on the conditions of a neighbouring country. (During his visit he said that Turkey was a country with high taxes and no financial stability and that its microeconomics were in a very difficult condition.)

It is high time that the young ministers got to know the most elementary protocol requirements.
-24 Chassa