February 15 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's prime minister Boyko Borissov has ordered the termination of a disputed procedure for the construction of two motorway sections, worth a total of 756.8 million levs ($426.7 million/387 million euro), the government's press office said in a brief statement early on Monday.
A few hours later, Bulgaria's ministry of regional development announced that the procedure for selecting contractors for Lot 1 and Lot 2 of Hemus motorway, which is designed to connect the capital of Sofia with the Black Sea city of Varna, has been cancelled due to inability to ensure EU funding for their construction.
However, the ministry's reasoning was dismissed by Borissov, who later told Bulgarian reporters in Prague (where he was attending a Visegrad Group meeting on refugees) that financing can be found, but there have been widespread suspicions in the society regarding the transparency of the selection process and the spending of state funds.
"Officially or unofficially there were doubts that this procedure was not right," Borisov said, adding that the bidders, which won the two separate tenders, could be connected with influential local businessmen Valentin Zlatev and Delyan Peevski.
The prime minister said that a new tender will be called, vowing full transparency.
In December, AM Hemus Lot 1 tie-up was chosen as the winner of tender to build Lot 1 of Hemus motorway after offering to carry out the works for 277.4 million levs, VAT excluded. The consortium is allegedly linked to Zlatev, the chief of the Bulgarian unit of Russia's Lukoil.
The other contract - for Lot 2 of the motorway, was awarded to the PST Hemus 2 consortium, which had submitted an offer worth 479.4 million levs. The alliance is associated with Peevski, a controversial media mogul with interests in a number of different businesses, as well as member of parliament.
Unlike other major road infrastructure projects that are supported by EU funds, the Bulgarian government had not secured financing for this two Hemus motorway stretches. They were planned to be funded by the state budget.
Two foreign firms that participated in the tenders - Italy's Serenissima Costruzioni and Turkish Tasyapi Insaat Tahhut Sanayi ve Ticaret - have appealed the two contract awards.
The two Hemus sections have a total length of 59 km. The planned length of the whole motorway, part of which is operational, is 433 km.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)