Seven face axe at Sofia municipality over alleged embezzlement
Seven officials at Sofia municipality’s directorate for local taxes and fees face dismissal in connection with alleged embezzlement of 621 000 leva (about 310 500 euro) by an employee, according to Doncho Barbalov, deputy mayor in charge of finance.
Municipal officials had detected the alleged embezzlement a few days ago and called in police from the fraud squad.
It had been established that a staff member of the directorate had abused the system to embezzle the money while those who had given the employee access to the system but had failed to exercise proper control also had been identified, according to Barbalov, as reported by local news agency Focus.
The alleged embezzlement took place over a number of months. It was detected after someone noticed an unusually high number of transactions.
He said that he had submitted a formal proposal to Sofia mayor Yordanka Fandukova for the dismissal of the seven.
Barbalov said that there was currently a check of all departments, part of ongoing internal monitoring at Sofia municipality.
(Photo: Clive Leviev-Sawyer)
