The company that buys Nova TV also wants to acquire Peevski’s newspapers in Bulgaria

© Julia Lazarova

United Group, which bought BTC and is in the process of acquiring Nova TV, also wants to buy MRF MP Delyan Peevski’s newspapers “Telegraph”, “Monitor”, “Politika”, “Meridian Match” “and” Lucha “. “Capital”, referring to the Antitrust Commission Buyer is United Media, a subsidiary of United Group.

In recent months, Peevski has tried to “clean up” his newspaper business by transferring the stamps to the newly created mirror company Vestnik Telegraf. According to “Capital”, this is explained by the fact that against the previous publisher – “Telegraph Media” there are dozens of pending civil cases filed by individuals and companies claiming to have suffered damage from the publications in “Telegraph” and “Monitor”.

After the newspaper stamps were transferred to the newly created “Vestnik Telegraf”, it went into liquidation. At the end of November, the Sofia District Court imposed a guarantee for a future lawsuit against the former publisher Telegraf Media, which could block the liquidation process of the company.

Some time ago, Dnevnik wrote that Peevski managed to find a way to circumvent one of the few laws he has been an importer to in his long career as a deputy, namely that of transparency of media ownership and financing by changing the publisher. . Thus, in practice, it avoids indicating sources of income after forcing others to do so.

United Group is a media and telecommunications group that is present in all the countries of the former Yugoslavia, and recently set foot in Bulgaria and Greece. The company has cable providers, satellite network, advertising businesses and produces content with several television channels.

The group was founded by Serbian businessman Dragan Sholak in 2000 as a small cable operator. It remains a minority shareholder with a stake of approximately 39%. The group began a series of acquisitions in the region after the group’s majority owner last year became London-based fund BC Partners with just over 50%. Thus, in addition to BTC United Group, it also acquired the Greek television, internet and telecommunications service provider Forthnet, as well as the Croatian Tele 2 Croatia. In addition to BC Partners and Sholak, the group’s shareholders are the EBRD and the KKR Fund.

The sale of Nova Broadcasting Group, owned by Kiril and Georgi Domuschievi, was known on Friday, December 11, and negotiations have been ongoing since the summer. The deal is also in the Commission for the Protection of Competition.