Premium
Bucharest Mayor-elect Nicusor Dan, said on Sunday evening on private broadcaster Romania TV that the debt of the City of Bucharest is around 4 billion lei, noting that the first thing to do is to reschedule payments so as to "keep the ship afloat".
"We have to start with the funding. Just like in a family, you have to know what you're counting on. Unfortunately, at the end of 2018, PMB [Bucharest City Hall]'s current debts were 3 billion lei. It seems that the city hall is not transparent at the moment and we do not know the exact figures, but it seems that the current debt is somewhere at 4 billion lei. This means that a City Council budget, i.e. the money you have to spend in four years, is already being spent by the administration. In other words, in four years, the money for five years was spent. The first thing we need to do is to see how to reschedule payments so that we can keep the ship afloat in the coming months and, on the other hand, set the European fund team going so that in the next few years we can make some considerable investment: surface metro, rehabilitation of the tram lines," Nicusor Dan said.
Dan claimed that (former Bucharest mayor) Gabriela Firea is a conflicted person, although she "says she wants to get along with everyone".
Prime Minister Ludovic Orban, for his part, said it was a "bad joke" that Gabriela Firea could not carry out the projects because of the PNL (National Liberal Party), noting that three years of her mandate were under the PSD (Social Democratic Party).
The Prime Minister also made it clear that re-organizations must be carried out in the Capital City Hall because, at the moment, it is "a generalized mayhem".
"There are numberless companies that have been set up that are doubled by the administration. You have 2-3 companies that deal with green spaces, parks, but you also have administration. (...) A security company has also been set up. I don't understand why you have a security company when you have a local police. There's something in there... The formation of the team is also about the realization of the administrative structure of Bucharest, because whatever is going on today is chaos. (...) There's something there, a generalized mayhem, they're stepping on their toes, they're running budgets, they don't have a mission, things need to be clarified," Orban said, adding that European funds must be obtained.
