The Republic Public Prosecutor’s Office of the Republika Srpska (RS) will send a proposal to the District Court in Banja Luka to order custody against Mladen Gajic, the director of the Doboj Hospital, on suspicion that he committed the criminal offense of Abuse of Official Position. Gajic, who was arrested, is suspected of using the emergency situation due to the coronavirus and obtaining a significant property benefit for the company “Travel for fun” to the detriment of budget funds. Who in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) is suspected of taking advantage of the state of the pandemic?
Arrests for abuse in the procurement of medical protective equipment and thermal cameras, as part of the investigation in the case of “Corona contracts”, which, it is suspected, in the last case damaged the budget of RS by about 600.000 BAM are the latest examples of controversial public procurement during the pandemic that is under the scrutiny of the Prosecution. They say that they are also working intensively on investigating the “Oxygen” affair. Certain documentation was exempted from the University Clinical Center (UCC), and a request was sent for the submission of documentation to the BiH Medicines Agency and other legal entities related to the case. Public procurements conducted by the RS Health Insurance Fund (HIF) from last year are also under scrutiny.
“We have formed a case when it comes to public procurement conducted by the HIF and we have sent an act to the Public Procurement Agency regarding illegal actions in public procurement procedures of the HIF. All necessary documentation is still being obtained and the case is in the verification phase, “said Dragica Tojagic, a spokeswoman for the RS Public Prosecutor’s Office.
The procurement, which was carried out according to the emergency procedure when it comes to the mobile hospital, was also disputable. However, under public pressure, the contract, which was also implemented through the Institute of Public Health, and for which the RS Government initially allocated 3.6 million BAM, was terminated. Who is to blame for what in cases of abuse during the pandemic will be determined by the judicial authorities. The question is whether the investigations will be carried out to the end, since, as the interlocutor who once performed the function of the director of the Institute of Public Health said, the orders usually come from, as he calls them, alienated centers of power.
“I was in exactly the same situation when there were floods where the body above me (the government and some crisis staff), sent me a document to procure something illegal. I was experienced and old enough so I refused. That’s why I was fired. Everything is agreed, everything is done, and then it goes down to a lower body to do something. After that, when something is said, it is the fault of that lower body,” explained Slobodan Stanic, the former RS health minister.
Transparency International believes that the abuses committed during the pandemic will finish at court.
“Unfortunately, we do not have judicial epilogues of all major scandals and so-called cases of high corruption. But, due to great public pressure and consistency of the topic because it is related to the endangering the health of the population, we see that institutions have started to react,” noted Damjan Ozegovic, Transparency International BiH.
“I expect more scandals related to various public procurements to occur during the pandemic, but not only in health but also in other spheres of life. The only epilogue that would make sense is severe punishments against the people who made them to send a message to those who come after them that they can’t behave like that, ” stated Rubina Cengic, a journalist and activist, BHRT writes.
E.Dz.
