Filenews 8 June 2022
In the third week of July, the Cypriot authorities are expected to submit to the European Commission a request to disburse the first tranche of the €85 million National Recovery and Resilience Plan, with the delay leading to a diversion of the initial timetable for the disbursement of the second tranche.
The timetable for the submission of the application for disbursement of the first instalment, scheduled for last February, was not respected due to disagreements between the executive and legislative powers over the access of credit acquiring companies to the data of the guarantors of non-performing loans in the Land Registry and the Artemis system. However, during the meeting of the Parliamentary Committee on Finance last Monday, a technical solution was found to the whole issue, which is considered to pave the way for the fulfilment of the last requirement that prevented the submission of the request for the first disbursement. According to information, access to the data of the guarantors will be made in cases where necessary and after the relevant request has been substantiated.
"An agreement has been reached with the House on a technical solution. This solution will be processed by the Ministry of Finance and the Legal Service and then the European Commission will be informed", the Director General of the Directorate General for Development, Theodosis Tsiolas, told CNA.
He explained that the amended bill will be re-debated in the Finance Committee on June 20 and is expected, if everything goes smoothly, to be taken to plenary for a vote in the 1st week of July.
"After the approval it takes two weeks to submit the request, which means the request will be submitted around the third week of July, if all goes well," Mr Tsiolas added.
Deflection of initial planning
The delay in submitting the request for the disbursement of the first tranche caused a chain delay in the planning and for the request for the disbursement of the second tranche, which was set for August.
"When you submit the application for the 1st tranche at the end of July, the procedures are extended for the rest, which means that the next application for disbursement, if all goes well, is in October or November," Mr. Tsiolas explained.
Asked if the first two disbursements could be consolidated, Mr Tsiolas said that initially thoughts were made to unify them "but technically it could not be done".
However, Mr. Tsiolas said that he believes that there is no risk of losing money from disbursements due to the delay in the timetable for the fulfilment of the milestones of the Recovery and Resilience Plan.
"If the first instalment passes we will run a little and speed up the procedures to stick to the timetables," he concluded.
The Recovery and Resilience Plan provides for a total funding of €1.2 billion, of which €1 billion in grants and €0.2 billion in loans.
