EUmoney

"European money is a large part of all public funds spent in our country. However, so far Bulgarian citizens have not had a mechanism to express their opinion on what is happening with this money. They also did not have the opportunity to report irregularities that they witnessed, "said Ognyan Georgiev of the team that created the site. "The idea is with EUmoney.bg, everyone who has information about irregularities and corruption to have an easy way to report it."

EUmoney.bg allows you to quickly and easily find information about each active project funded by the European Union in Bulgaria. Projects can be searched by their name, the place where they are implemented, the beneficiary or their contractor, by keyword and other criteria.

However, the main function of the site is different: to provide a feedback tool on how EU funds are invested.

Citizens will be able to leave comments on how projects are being implemented, as well as send anonymous reports of abuse and corruption. Comments will be visible to all and can serve as an indicator of whether a project is developing properly or not.

The signals of abuse reach the team of the Anti-Corruption Fund, which will check them and, if necessary, further investigate. In cases where there are suspicions of abuse, the ACF experts will prepare and send signals to the competent Bulgarian and European institutions.

"The site has been active for several weeks and we have already received several reports of violations, which we have considered. One of them had enough grounds to prepare and send a signal to the responsible institutions, "said Lora Georgieva, legal adviser at the Anti-Corruption Fund.

This is a case of suspicion of buying and selling votes and irregularities related to European funds in the village of Valnari, Nikola Kozlevo municipality. The signal, submitted through EUmoney.bg, claims that the mayor of the village Nikola Kozlevo has pressured several employees in his private company to vote for a certain candidate in the parliamentary elections in April 2021. The employees were appointed in the mayor's shops on a project "Creating sustainable jobs for the unemployed and inactive in Esrefoglu Ltd., funded by the European Social Fund - Human Resources Development. Information about the case is also contained in a journalistic investigation by Genka Shikerova, published in Free Europe. [1]

In this case, the ACF experts contacted the coordination unit with the European Fraud Office OLAF - Directorate "Protection of the European Union's Financial Interests" in the Ministry of Interior, the Minister of Interior and the Prosecutor's Office.

"Mechanisms such as EUmoney.bg enable Bulgarian citizens to closely monitor how the funds spent on European projects in the country are spent. We hope that the signals coming through this platform will meet the active reaction of the institutions, so as to protect the interests of Bulgarian and European taxpayers, "said Boyko Stankushev, director of the Anti-Corruption Fund.

The team of EUmoney.bg will present the site today, 16.09.2021, from 11 am in the SOHO hall at 4 Iskar Street. You can watch the live broadcast on the Facebook channel of the Anti-Corruption Fund here

EUmoney.bg was established with funding from the European Union under a project implemented by the Anti-Corruption Fund and co-financed by the Directorate General for Regional and Settlement Policy of the European Commission.

The opinions expressed on the site reflect the views of their authors and not necessarily the position of the European Commission and / or the Anti-Corruption Fund Foundation. The European Commission is not responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.