COFFEE AND CROISSANTS, PLEASE
For reasons that are not immediately obvious and are therefore difficult to explain Bulgaria has gained the reputation of being a generator of genius computerists
It probably is, but the genius computerists hide themselves very well, and certainly do not work for Boyko Borisov's government.
A set of supposedly confidential documents in MS Word, Excel etc, outlining Bulgaria's plans to request money from the EU for the National Recovery and Sustainability Plan post the Covid-19 pandemic were posted on Google Drive. Whoever did that left the docs unlocked, so anyone could edit and so on.
Bulgarians with better knowledge of computers than the civil servants were quick to use the unexpected opportunity. One demanded coffee and croissants. Another asked "Where are my children's books?", possibly referring to the one book, Winnetou by Karl May, Prime Minister Boyko Borisov has admitted to reading.
The government has spent in excess of 2 billion leva (1 billion euros) on "digitalisation."
Boyko Borisov has asserted that the National Recovery Plan, which must be submitted to the EU by 30 April, will be left over for the next government. In this way the EU's poorest country risks being left outside the comprehensive recovery programme.
A few hours after the "leak" someone, apparently a supervisor, sent out a message warning the officials not to post unlocked files on Google Drive. That message was itself unlocked, so everyone could join the reading party.
Some people bothered to look into the attached links as well. What they discovered was that "modernisation" in fact referred to sprucing up a kindergarten while "digitalisation" meant renovating a building.
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