site.btaParliament Sets Up Ad Hoc Committee on Government Spending in Last Ten Years

April 16 (BTA) - Parliament Friday voted, 214-0, to adopt
 a resolution setting up an ad hoc committee which will probe
spending by the government and by companies with over 50 per
cent State interest in the last ten years.

GERB dominated three governments during that period but is
unlikely to win enough support for a new government despite
coming first in the April 4 elections.

The 240-seat National Assembly held its inaugural sitting on
Thursday.

Initially, the Rise Up! Thugs Out! parliamentary group proposed
that the ad hoc committee should audit the expenditures of the
Council of Ministers and of companies held over 50 per cent by
the State in the last four years. During the debate, Jordan
Tzonev MP of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF)
suggested that the committee should do a probe because
Parliament does not have auditing powers. He also said pension
companies should be left out of the probe because they have
already been stress-tested by the EU institutions and are
privately owned.

On a proposal by Roumen Hristov MP of GERB-UDF, the time-frame
of the probe was expanded to the last ten years.

The MPs rejected a proposal by BSP for Bulgaria Floor Leader
Kornelia Ninova that by the same resolution, Parliament should
impose a moratorium on concessions, sales of state-owned and
municipal hospitals and appointments to the state
administration, regulators and companies owned over 50 per cent
by the State until a new government is elected. The MRF and
Democratic Bulgaria groups noted that it would be better to have
 a separate draft resolution on the moratorium, and Ninova said
she was ready to table it next week.

Maya Manolova, Floor Leader of Rise Up! Thugs Out!, was elected
chair of the ad hoc committee by a vote of 147 in favour, with
one abstention. Georgi Georgiev MP of There Is Such a People was
 elected deputy chair. Parliament voted 217-0 to approve the 16
members: three each from GERB-UDF, BSP for Bulgaria, MRF, and
Democratic Bulgaria, and two each from There Is Such a People
and Rise Up! Thugs Out!. RI/DD





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