The award and implementation of public procurement in Bulgaria should guarantee the civic interest in spending public finances, but in recent years it has become the embodiment of corrupt practices in the country. The most appetizing bite is the public procurement in the field of construction, where the projects are large-scale and amount to millions of euros.

"Public procurement tenders in Bulgaria are not won, they are distributed," said in an interview with BNR's Horizon program Assoc. Prof. Metodi Andreev from the Chamber of Engineers in Investment Design, a lecturer at the University of Architecture, Civil Engineering and Urban Planning in Sofia. PM Boyko Borissov has created a public administration that awards public contracts and creates "an extremely serious corruption environment”, the professor claims.

In this sense, we from the Chamber of Engineers in Investment Design, as well as from the Chamber of Architects, have repeatedly expressed a serious position against this form of practice of the investment process "construction", but in the end there is no audibility, said Andreev. What are the consequences?

"First, the emergence of financial dependence of the designer on the builder, as the first – the designer, must satisfy the wishes of the builder. This restricts the freedom of design decisions by the designer, and in most cases they are not in the interest of quality and safety of the construction, but have a purely commercial nature, satisfying the economic interest of the builder, as well as political factors which have lobbied to win the respective public procurement. In addition, the leading role of the builder in the production process gives him the opportunity to choose a loyal designer who often does not have the relevant experience and qualifications, but is ready for his fee to protect the financial interest of the builder. As a result, low-quality projects and low-quality construction are created. Then there is a formal supervision carried out by other designers financially dependent on the builder, which is to the detriment of the quality and cost of construction. This leads to poor quality of construction, combined with high, one might say, corrupt price level," explains Andreev.

According to him, in order to have an optimal price, good quality and protection of the public interest, the main participants in the process must be independent. The engineering practiced in Bulgaria "eliminates this financial independence and turns the builder into a "ruler" of the investment process. And behind him is the jagged face of Bulgarian political corruption”, Andreev says.

Metodi Andreev sees the role of the construction oligarchy in "arguing for some money", using public resources, the budget, part of the European programs and returning some of this money "in the form of commissions of political factors".

This whole machine is pushing small and medium-sized construction companies to the periphery, which are experiencing serious difficulties in the current crisis situation. In this regard, there have been suggestions for changing the priorities and instead of large construction sites such as highways, for example, the funds could be reallocated to smaller municipalities, to renovation of the urban environment in order to help small businesses in the sector.

"I claim that no one in the country is against construction and investment”, says Metodi Andreev. “We are against the way these public procurement projects are implemented. We are against the poor quality, for which, of course, construction companies cannot be blamed. Because if a company has been awarded a public procurement and has to return in the form of commissions and bribes 40-50% of its amount, it will not produce a quality product. Hence the problem of small and medium-sized companies. Because in Bulgaria there are 20-30 large companies that appear in various forms in all public procurement in the field of construction. These companies are known for always being very close to those in power. Winning the orders, they use small and medium-sized companies as subcontractors. Many times large companies do not pay their obligations to small and medium-sized companies. In addition, there is a very strong lobbying legislation, which further aggravates the financial burden of Bulgarian citizens," says the expert, according to whom corruption explains all the negative phenomena that are currently flourishing in the construction sector in this country.

"This corruption is pandemic in Bulgaria, it has become a symbol of the governance”, the specialist from the Chamber of Engineers in Investment Design Assoc. Prof. Metodi Andreev firmly points out.

Edited by Elena Karkalanova