site.btaVazrazhdane: If Government Does Not Make Reforms in Its First Year, It Will Never Do So

Commenting on the draft 2026 state budget, Dimo Drenchev MP of Vazrazhdane told journalists Thursday that there is no time for experiments. If a government does not carry out reforms in its first year - or even in its first 100 days, it will never do so, he argued.  

“Vazrazhdane’s proposals regarding the state budget are to return contributions from the universal pension funds to the National Social Security Institute (NSSI). This would reduce the NSSI’s deficit by nearly EUR 4 billion," Drenchev said. There are many areas where cuts can be made, such as introducing a temporary tax on banks’ excess profits, he noted, adding that banks are the only ones benefiting from the country’s entry into the eurozone so far.

The MP noted that concessions are only part of the solution. The proposed introduction of a 10% tax on profits from gambling activities will be very difficult to pass because it will apply only to intermediaries. In other words, it will once again turn out that not much money is being collected, he added.

On the planned increase of vignette fees, Drenchev commented that the amount collected from them will likely be very small. "If we compare this to neighbouring Romania, the road toll stickers in Bulgaria will become much more expensive. Currently, they are roughly the same price, meaning Bulgarians will pay about 30% more than Romanians for road use, and the revenue collected will amount to roughly what we pay to BOTAS in two or three months," Drenchev noted. He was referring to a 2023 agreement with Turkish energy company BOTAS under which the Bulgarian side booked capacity of 106.4GWh/day on the Turkish LNG regasification terminals and agreed to pay for this EUR 512,000 daily for a period ending in 2035.

Regarding the Government's intention to close the Commission for Disclosing the Documents and Announcing Affiliation of Bulgarian Citizens to the State Security and Intelligence Services of the Bulgarian People's Army, Drenchev said that the Vazrazhdane party had proposed the same in a total of four previous budgets. The Archives State Agency can handle this work. Last year, their budget was BGN 5 to 6 million; it would be very good if these funds could be saved, he argued. "We propose reducing the number of ministries - at least three of them are completely unnecessary - but we could go much further," Drenchev told reporters.