February 23 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's prime minister Boyko Borissov said on Friday that he will accept the resignation of energy minister Temenuzhka Petkova, which she said will tender in response to allegations of her involvement in the sale of assets of Czech energy group CEZ in Bulgaria to a local buyer.
Petkova said earlier on Friday that she will step down following media allegations that she is connected to the owner of Sofia-based Inercom, to which Czech power utility CEZ has decided to sell a package of its assets in Bulgaria.
"When I come back I will have a meeting with our coalition partners, I'll tell them what I think and together we are going to decide who will replace her," Boyko Borissov said in a live stream from Brussels, posted on his official Facebook profile.
"I think she is an honest person but you can't erase a 20-year friendship," Borissov added.
On Friday, Temenuzhka Petkova confirmed she knows the owner of Inercom Bulgaria, Ginka Varbakova, but denied having any family relations to her as local media had claimed, Bulgarian public radio BNR reported.
On Thursday, CEZ Group said its supervisory board granted consent to the sale of the group's Bulgarian assets to Inercom Bulgaria for an undisclosed sum.
The contract is expected to be signed in a few days, CEZ said.
The package contains seven companies - power distributor CEZ Distribution Bulgaria [BUL:3CZ], power supplier CEZ Electro Bulgaria [BUL:1CZ], licensed electricity trader CEZ Trade Bulgaria, IT services company CEZ ICT Bulgaria, solar park Free Energy Project Oreshetz, biomass-fired power plant Bara Group and CEZ Bulgaria, which manages and coordinates the operations of the group's Bulgarian units.
Inercom manages seven solar parks in southern Bulgaria with a total capacity of over 100 MW.