In mid-December, the municipal enterprise “Forests and lands” in Sevlievo has commissioned, by direct agreement, to the company “Private Forest Enterprise Gabrovo” to cut 360 poplars along the Rositsa River. All the documentation on the tender and the price of the activities carried out were deeply classified by the director of the municipal structure, Alexander Penkov. An investigation of “Pro Veritas”, however, found that the owner of the company-contractor is the 84-year-old Gergana Lilova. And the traces of its real owners lead to the former Minister of Agriculture and Forestry Miroslav Naydenov and to the former GERB MP Emil Dimitrov.
Internal rot
According to foresters, the poplars near the Rosica River have been sown more than 20 years ago and have become dangerous for this period. The trees were aging, their inner core was beginning to rot and they became unstable, the foresters say. Therefore, it was imperative to cut them off and to plant new ones in their place. The felling in the Sevlievo coastal zone was also included in the forest management plan of the area, from the municipal enterprise “Forests and lands” explained.
On the first working day of the week, the Deputy Director of the Municipal Enterprise “Forests and Land” Alexander Atanasov explained that since 2016, several attempts have been made to find a contractor for cutting off the poplars. According to him, until the winter of 2017, three competitions were scheduled. The information on their organization – orders, protocols and contracts – should be public. It turned out, however, that it was not published anywhere. It can not be obtained from Atanasov, as he thinks that the documents were locked in the office of the director of the company, Alexander Penkov.
Atanassov did not remember the exact dates of the selected contests for choosing a felling contractor, and his manager was constantly absent. That’s why he handily recorded our contact phone and promised that director Penkov himself would call for a conversation. Until the work on this text is completed, however, there is no feedback from him.
According to Alexander Atanasov, from the three scheduled contests only the last one – from December last year – ended with the selection of a contractor. There were no candidates for the first two, which is no surprise, since information on contests can not be found anywhere until now. For this reason, the company decided the third contest to be with direct negotiation. Atanasov says invitations have been sent to four companies. But their names remain secret as well, as they were also mentioned in the documentation, locked in the office of the absent director Penkov.
Publicity and transparency
In the order for opening the procedure for direct negotiation with a contractor of the felling, Alexander Atanasov was appointed as contact person. When asked about where and when the information was published, the Deputy Director of “Forests and Lands” replied with the question: “Isn’t it on the site of the Municipality?” He then explained that the announcements of the contest had been stuck in two places – “in the lobby of the Municipality and at the entrance of the House of Culture” in Sevlievo.
It is important to note that in the same building the offices of the municipal enterprise “Forests and Land” itself are situated. Sounds frivolous, of course. This undermines the provision of conditions for free and fair competition in the process of cutting 360 poplars.
The contest for the felling of poplars near the Rositsa River was held on December 15, last year. However, because of the secrecy in which it is wrapped, no information has yet been published about what was the price offered by the winner – “Private Forest Enterprise Gabrovo”, nor what was the received score of its offer. As a hidden picture also remains the question what are the prices offered by the other bidders?
The owner, the proxy and the others
The owner of “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo” is 84-year-old Gergana Lilova, a reference in the Commercial Register shows. In this one, as well as in all other contests of the Municipality of Sevlievo, she participated through her proxy Vladimir Genchev – husband of Zornitsa Alexieva – regional coordinator for Gabrovo of BASTA party. The political formation, as is known, was founded by the former Minister of Agriculture Miroslav Naydenov and the former MP of GERB Emil Dimitrov. In his mandate as a Member of Parliament, he was also deputy chairman of the parliamentary commission on agriculture and forestry. Dimitrov was forced to give up his immunity as a MP because a company in which he was a shareholder proved to be one among the 47 exchanges of forests for which the European Commission warned that Bulgaria could pay sanctions for unlawful state aid.
In 2002, Emil Dimitrov acquired the concession rights on the Sherba hunting farm near Varna. At that time the manager of the farm was Alexander Penkov himself. He was appointed Director of the Municipal Enterprise “Forests and Land” in Sevlievo only in 2016. Accidentally or not, but at that time also “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo” started to appear in the Sevlievo contests for logging. And was winning them!
Cut and sell!
The company of 84-year-old Gergana Lilova is not only engaged in logging. Another activity is trade with wood. That is why, despite the fact that in the order for the cutting of 360 poplars there is no provision for their purchase, the “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo” has become the owner of more than 1200 cubic meters wood. This has been learned by “Pro Veritas” from a source wishing to be anonymous. According to this source, the buyout application was filed yet on May 12 last year – eight months before organizing the tender for sanitary felling near the Rositsa River. Soon after the end of the felling, the poplar trees were in the warehouses of two timber processing companies, it is clear from the inspection of the transport tickets for their transport. These companies are “Kronoshpan Bulgaria” in Veliko Tarnovo and the general partnership company”Izgrev 90″ in Sevlievo.
The doubts of competitors
In July 2016, the name of “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo” became known alongside an open tender for the sale of wood from municipal forests in the Lagut locality. It is about 5,000 cubic meters of white pine, beech, oak, hornbeam and acacia. The initially announced price was just over BGN 174,000, but in the bidding process it reached almost half a million BGN. This tender was also won by the company of Gergana Lilova, but the proxy did not sign a performance contract, probably because it turned out that during the bidding he has lead the deal to unrealisticaly high price.
Prior to the date of the tender, representatives of timber companies sought out the media to make public their doubts that the municipal administration in Sevlievo tolerated one of the participants. All of them pointed out no other but “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo”. The reasons for these allegations were that none but the Gabrovo company was able to obtain a protocol from a forest inspection without which the participation in the bidding was impossible. On the other hand, there was no way to carry out the inspection, since at the same time the designated contact person did not lift his mobile phone and was on leave. The issue was resolved only after the media intervened.
“Suspicions of Corrupt Practices”
Another case related to the suspicions of tolerance of “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo” was in early February this year when representatives of twelve logging companies sent a signal to the Prosecutor’s Office for lack of transparency in conducting tenders for buying wood from the municipal enterprise “Forests and Lands” in Sevlievo.
The signal to the Prosecutor’s Office, filed by twelve logging companies.
Illustration: „Pro Veritas“
In the text, permit documents for wood felling with a volume of 1400 cubic meters were cited, the sale of which was also organized in the dark. “These actions of the municipal enterprise”Land and Forests” suggest that the management and conclusion of contracts takes place in a way that gives us doubts about corrupt practices, the implementation of which benefits (…) “Private Forestry Enterprise Gabrovo”, it was written in the signal to the prosecutor’s office. So far, however, there is no response.
“Appropriate and transparent” but another time
The doubts that the municipal enterprise “Forests and Lands” in Sevlievo works in the dark have another serious ground. The enterprise is a secondary disposer of budget funds and therefore does not appear in the “Buyer’s Profile” section of the local administration site. There should be the information about all tender procedures that the municipality organizes. The enterprise does not have its own website. For the two years since it was founded, the publicity of its activity is apparently only made on paper, glued next to the entrance of its own building or in the corridors of the local administration in Sevlievo This practice has nothing to do with the suggestion of the mayor Ivan Ivanov for the establishment of “Forests and Land”. The text, bearing his signature, reads as follows: “Given the importance of municipal forests, meadows and pastures, it is necessary to establish a municipal enterprise for their management – good, lawful, expedient and transparent.
Video of TV “Channel Focus“ you can see here.
