Filenews 20 February 2026 - by Angelos Nikolaou
The Government is proceeding with urgent procedures to amend the legislation on Fiscal Responsibility, paving the way for the construction of new desalination plants through bypasses.
According to the draft law approved by the Council of Ministers, the proposed amendment to Article 89 of the Basic Law allows, for the first time, a complete derogation from the strict project evaluation procedures provided for in Articles 84 to 88.
In essence, this amendment gives the Ministry of Agriculture and the stakeholders the freedom to proceed with the implementation of desalination projects without submitting: Project notes which record the necessity and strategic planning, as well as viability studies, i.e. these projects to be licensed without a thorough economic and technical analysis for their long-term viability.
The Introductory Report invokes the "intense phenomenon of water scarcity" and the need to ensure water supply within 2026. However, the use of the urgency procedure for the submission of the bill to the Parliament shows the intention of the executive power to issue express permits, until December 31, 2026, for projects related to the supply/production of drinking water through desalination.
With this proposal, it is proposed to amend the Fiscal Responsibility and Financial Framework Law, in order to amend article 89 of the basic law, to introduce an explicit, limited and time-bound derogation from the usual procedures of articles 84 to 88, exclusively for desalination projects implemented within the current year, in the context of addressing the need for water supply.
Under the current wording of Article 89, the Minister of Finance is given a general authority to define procedures, methodology, criteria and other requirements through regulations and/or directives.
However, it is noted that following the intense phenomenon of water scarcity observed in the last period, there has been a need to amend the Fiscal Responsibility and the Financial Framework Law of 2014 (Law 20(I)/2014), which aims to immediately address water scarcity through a special regulation, which allows the implementation of simplified procedures for the implementation of specific desalination projects for the purpose of ensuring water sufficiency. resources within the current year.
