Slovakian government will have to return EUR 100 mln.

Slovakian government will have to return EUR 100 mln.

Due to mistakes, made by the government of Mikulas Dzurinda, Slovakia will have to return EUR 100 million to the EU, stated the prime-minister Robert Fico. According to Mr. Fico, previous government received several deficiency reports from the European Commission, but failed to heed the warnings. As a result, nation’s budget will have to come up with additional money, as the funds given by the EU have already been spent. The prime-minister said that a reserve for this purpose has already been created.

The words of Robert Fico are supported by the statements of the Eurocommission auditing missions and the European Court of Justice. According to their reports, the deficiency was found as early as 2005, yet nothing was done about it.

The deficiency of such a size didn’t appear out of nowhere. According to Chief of the Public Procurement Office Bela Angyal and Slovakia’s Finance Ministry, much of that debt is due to the mistakes in public tenders. The EU auditors have also found numerous deficiencies in the annexes to concluded contracts. Mr. Angyal claims that the EU did not accept these annexes. As a result, the contracts were considered as awarded in a negotiated procedure without a contract notice, implying that there was not competition at all.

According to Mr. Angyal, the financial problems haven’t been solved yet. As the result, the European Commission may demand corrections in the finances in future. This will be an additional difficulty in managing Slovakia’s debt, which amounted to 17.7 billion Euros (26% GDP) at the end of last year.

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Date: 04/10/2009