There is every indication that something is up with the empire of notorious businessman Tsvetan Vassilev, now a fugitive outside Bulgaria - that it is either falling apart or is mutating. Until last year the oligarch, as many call him, who gained notoriety with his business dealings and schemes ruled companies, concerns, banks, factories, media and even football clubs and MEPs, whose aggregate value amounted to almost 10 percent of the country’s GDP. After a string of scandals and conflicts with some of the most influential political figures, the shocking truth about the fourth biggest bank in the country, owned by the businessman – the Corporate Commercial Bank, that was to cost the country so dearly, is now out.

The bank turned out to be bankrupt and was first closed down and then had its licence revoked. Leaving behind a EUR 2 million debt to depositors subsequently paid by the Deposit Insurance Fund in Bulgaria and the state with the help of a new public debt. Then came the Bulgarian Telecommunications Company, the country’s telecom through the years, controlled by the same allegedly financially sound businessman and known by its brand name Vivacom plus four more companies, key to Bulgaria’s economy, one of which dealing in armaments. And this after the state in its capacity of the former bank’s biggest creditor took drastic legislative measures to get back at least some of the money paid out to its depositors. The right people for this extremely high-risk venture appeared out of the blue – a group of people from France, Belgium and Russia nobody had ever heard of, claiming to represent a European investment fund called LIC33.

The company’s website was launched online the very day these “European investors” made public their plans to take over control of the telecom. Yet the website offers no business information about the company’s activities worth mentioning, except for its appetites in Bulgaria and the promise to pay the debts of Tsvetan Vassilev’s five companies amounting to some EUR 900 million, to get the telecom back on its feet and ultimately to sell it. Meanwhile it became clear that there may be some truth in that, at least as far as the ownership of the Bulgarian Telecommunications Company is concerned, when it was announced that its majorityshareholder Tsvetan Vassilev really had struck a deal with LIC33 in Luxembourg. How much he was paid for it is not known, though mention is made of the sum of EUR 1, which may actually be true, seeing as the buyer also acquired debts running to almost EUR 1 billion.

The players in this latest lurid financial transaction involving the Bulgarian Telecommunications Company and what remains of the Tsvetan Vassilev conglomerate are now definitely in the public eye. Prestigious publications in the country reveal a Russian connection, mention has even been made of the name of President Vladimir Putin and the Russian Orthodox church. Russia is a country with a powerful economy and interests covering a very broad range of spheres, especially in Bulgaria, a country with fast ties with Russia in terms of its history, culture and religion. But in light of the current geopolitical confrontation between Western civilization and Russia even Sofia has to comply with its official membership of the EU and NATO. Be as it may, tempted by the thought of having EUR 900 million enter the national coffers, the Bulgarian authorities will find it very difficult to hand over the strategic assets of the former national telecom, with its entire land and mobile network which is still vital to national security, to people nobody knows anything about. In any case before making a decision the government has decided to check the provenance of the money the “European investors” have promised to come up with, no one knows how, which they plan to invest in Bulgaria.

English version: Milena Daynova