By: J. M. (Moja Dolenjska)
The European Commission Slovenia has still not approved any request for disbursement of funds from the Recovery and Resilience Fund. Slovenia is highlighted in Brussels as one of the problems, there is also a great fear that the agreed European funds will not be used.
The funds are therefore at risk, most of them are irreversible.
In a letter she sent to Finance Minister Klemen Boštjančič, MEP Romana Tomc pointed out that MEPs recently discussed the issue of withdrawing funds from the Plan for Recovery and Resilience fund.
Slovenia was singled out as one of the examples where implementation is far behind the intended plan. This is precisely why there is great fear in the European institutions that the plan will not be fully implemented, which would mean a great loss of European funds.
Money in Brussels was negotiated for Slovenia in the summer of 2020 by the government led by Janez Janša. According to the data known so far, Slovenia received approximately 231 million euros as part of pre-financing in September 2021.
According to the plan, the first and second payment requests should have been sent together, namely in the second quarter of 2022, which did not happen. The third request was supposed to be sent in the fourth quarter of 2022, which also did not happen.
The first request was submitted only in October 2022, i.e., much later than planned, while the second and third requests have not been submitted yet. The reasons for this backlog are said to be non-fulfilment of goals or milestones, which means that Robert Golob’s government did not provide the conditions for the withdrawal of European funds, so the requests were not sent to Brussels either.
Romana Tomc also informed Boštjančič from Golob’s Gibanje Svoboda party that “it is very unpleasant that Slovenia is treated as a problematic country in discussions”.
She reminded him that his task as the responsible minister is to do everything in his power to ensure that there will be no delays in the withdrawal of European funds and that the funds available under the Recovery and Resilience Plan will not be lost.
She also asked the Minister of Finance to clarify the reasons for the delays in the European Parliament for further discussions and explanations. So far, we have not found any precise explanations.
Drawing European funds is extremely important, of which investments in Slovenia are also important. Under Janša’s government, Slovenia was among the most successful EU member states. But now we have once again descended into the worst. Accordingly, investments in the country also stalled. Only those that were started during the government of Janez Janša (2020 – 2022) are ending.
We also remind you of the hours-long negotiations held by Slovenia in Brussels, where the team led by Janša achieved extraordinary success. Now Golob’s or the members of the left-wing government cannot even draw from it.
Last but not least, let us remind you how Tanja Fajon, then still in her role as an MEP, in Brussels systematically tried to prevent the EU from granting Slovenia money. She is now the Minister of Foreign Affairs.