Finance Minister Galab Donev
Bulgaria’s Finance Ministry has formally launched the budget procedure for 2026, with Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Galab Donev outlining a broad package of austerity and restructuring measures that he said would put an end to what he described as years of “financial acrobatics” and uncontrolled spending.
At a briefing at the Council of Ministers, Donev announced that the government of “Progressive Bulgaria” plans to eliminate automatic salary increases for senior state positions, including ministers, deputy ministers, members of parliament, regulatory officials, magistrates, university leadership, and law enforcement executives. Performance-based bonuses for elected officials are also expected to be removed.
Donev stated that the draft budget would be reviewed “pen by pen” and declared that the era of what he called “patchwork budgets” was over. According to him, previous administrations had relied on advance payments and delayed obligations in order to artificially improve fiscal indicators.
The Finance Minister accused former governments of following a policy of “we spend today, let the next ones think about it,” pointing to a reported budget deficit of 1.75 billion euros by the end of April, alongside another 2.55 billion euros in unpaid expenses awaiting settlement.
