Three decisions concerning the disposal of municipal properties, adopted by the Borino Municipal Council on 17 June with near-unanimous support, were returned as unlawful by the regional governor. A month later, the same councillors unanimously revoked them without debate and without asking who had prepared the flawed case files or why they themselves had approved them in the first place.
Three reports submitted by Mayor Mustafa Karaahmed, three decisions by the Municipal Council and three findings of violations of the Municipal Property Act. That was the outcome of the work of Borino’s municipal administration and local legislature at their 17 June meeting.
The documents had passed through the administration, the standing committees and the council chamber. At no point along the way did anyone detect an incorrect property, missing documents, contradictory legal grounds or an attempt to sell publicly owned municipal property.
Wrong property and missing valuations
Under Decision No. 300, the councillors authorised the establishment of a right to build an extension for a 50 sq m storage facility.
However, the application and accompanying documents concerned property with cadastral identifier 05462.501.835, while the adopted decision referred to a different property – 05462.501.837.
During the meeting, the title of the mayor’s report was corrected. It initially referred to the “construction of an external staircase” and was later changed to a storage facility.
The councillors corrected the title but failed to notice that they were actually voting on the wrong plot of land.
The regional governor also found that no municipal property deed had been attached, that the beneficiary of the right had not been explicitly identified, and that both a market valuation and a tax valuation were missing.
Despite this, the Municipal Council set a price of BGN 125 excluding VAT and authorised the mayor to implement the decision.
The decision was adopted with nine votes in favour from all nine councillors present.
They discussed the rent, but not the law
Under Decision No. 302, the Municipal Council extended for another five years the lease of 72 sq m of premises in the building of Nikola Vaptsarov Secondary School.
The file contained an unsigned copy of a lease agreement that had not yet expired. No municipal property deed had been provided, the premises had not been individually identified, and the decision simultaneously referred to an annex and authorised the mayor to sign a new agreement.
The building is public municipal property.
According to the regional governor, the premises should have been leased through a public tender or competition, rather than by automatically extending the existing lease.
The councillors did have a brief discussion – but not about the legal procedure. They debated whether the rent should be €50 or €72.
They chose the higher amount and approved the decision with eight votes in favour and one abstention.
Public property offered for sale
Under Decision No. 304, the council authorised the sale by tender of a property at 58 Rodopi Street at an assessed value of €1,991 excluding VAT.
The problem is that the property is publicly owned municipal property and cannot be sold to a private party under the procedure used.
It is not even clear exactly what was being offered for sale.
The application refers to a 6 sq m object, while the decision refers to “6/100” and “6/100 sq m”.
The attached municipal property deed concerns an object with a different cadastral identifier.
This decision, too, was adopted without questions – with eight votes in favour from all eight councillors present.
Unanimity without accountability
On 15 July, all 11 municipal councillors voted to revoke the three decisions.
Yet the detailed violations set out in the regional governor’s six-page order were reduced in the council minutes to the convenient phrase “omissions”.
There was no discussion of how the mistakes had occurred.
No one asked who had prepared the reports, who had assembled the case files or what the standing committees had actually checked.
None of the councillors explained why they had supported the decisions a month earlier.
Even the revocation was handled carelessly.
The minutes cite the wrong number of the regional governor’s order, while Decision No. 308 says it is revoking a decision adopted on 17 June 2025 instead of 17 June 2026.
The very same day, the first case was resubmitted.
The incorrect property identifier had been corrected, and a valuation by a licensed appraiser had been included.
But new Decision No. 310 contains the phrase “one hundred and thirty-three euros sixty-three euros”, while the mayor’s report still gives the old price of €63.91.
The result is a closed administrative loop in Borino: a poorly prepared report, unquestioning approval, a decision returned by the regional governor, unanimous revocation and then a new decision containing fresh errors.
