State Institutions Are "Drained" Like Private Companies

"In previous mandates state institutions were "captured from the inside" and "drained" of their financial resources like private companies.," said Executive Director Stefan Popov a day after RiskMonitor's conference "Organized Crime and Political Process". "We understood this through several drastic cases like SAPARD, the Road Agency, "Toplofikacia". In reality the process has been massive in this country. Whole ministries have been captured from inside. This could only happen through political mechanisms." According to Mr. Popov the State has to fight to release itself from its own malignant capacity to generate criminality, which is visible at large scale with vote-buying in local elections.

In Bulgaria, as well as in the whole region, crime that is organized is in tight connections with political elites and institutions, and with the "political" as a whole. It remains to be seen if the transition period in Bulgaria could be characterized as "criminal". Stefan Popov thinks that such a proposition could be a result of distanced historical reflection.

"Just metaphorically, the transition period in Bulgaria resembles the conquest of a new continent, say, America" added Stefan Popov. He stated that in 1990 it was very hard for the regulatory mechanisms to prevent the privatization in the sense of plundering, and the state institutions were not prepared for this scale of political corruption.

Stefan Popov stressed that the European Commission, when talking about organized crime, not always clearly understands what it means in Bulgaria, and that Brussels tends to use arbitrary concepts.

Interview with Stefan Popov
Bulagarian National Radio, Horizon Program, Before All Broadcast, 2 December 2009