site.btaThree Government Ministers Elaborate on Policy Plans

Veliko Turnovo, Northern Bulgaria, September 22 (BTA) - Three government ministers gave a joint news conference in Veliko Turnovo on Friday to elaborate on their plans for future projects.

Energy Minister Temenouzhka Petkova said the liberalization of the national electricity market will take between three and five years. After the process is completed, every household in Bulgaria will be able to choose its electricity supplier and there will be competition between the suppliers.

The liberalization model was drawn up with the assistance of the World Bank and includes protection of energy-poor people who cannot pay their bills, Petkova said. "Statements that energy poverty will increase after the model is changed are highly exaggerated," she observed.

The electricity market liberalization process will be triggered by Energy Act amendments which are to become effective by the end of 2017. The regulatory groundwork for the implementation of the new model should be in place by the second half of 2018, Petkova said.

Regional Development and Public Works Minister Nikolai Nankov expressed hope that the construction of the Yablanitsa-Teteven section of the Hemus Motorway in Northern Bulgaria will begin later in 2017. If that happens, Nankov said, the 9.3 km section can be completed by the end of 2019. He noted that the government wants to see about 100 km of the Hemus Motorway built by the end of its term in office in 2021 in addition to the parts that already exist. The plan is that the whole motorway should be completed by 2024. The future finished road will link the capital Sofia with the seaside city of Varna.

Contracts for building another speedway in Northern Bulgaria which will link Rousse with Veliko Turnovo will begin to be signed in 2018, Nankov went on to say. "The two highways will drive forward the demographic and economic development of Northern Bulgaria," he predicted.

Labour and Social Policy Minister Bisser Petkov said social care for people with mental disorders will be a highlight in the work of his department. Mental patients will be gradually taken out of the old residential care institutions and put into community care schemes. The idea is to create conditions for independent and decent living for these people. The first stage of the process will be financed by Operational Programme "Regions in Growth" and will continue until 2021. Mental patients will be accommodated in protected family-type homes, up to 30 people to a unit. The effort will cost 50 million leva.

Tsvetan Tsvetanov, Deputy Chairman and Floor Leader of the ruling GERB party, said the government does not distinguish between individual municipalities along party lines. He recalled that contracts totalling 43 million leva have been signed with municipalities under the Rural Development Programme. Eight million leva of that funding will go to three municipalities in Veliko Turnovo Region.