Croatia's State Attorneys Office, DORH, is investigating possible misuse of power by the Environment Minister, Mihael Zmajlovic, following an anonymous complaint.
In the complaint made to DORH, Zmajlovic is accused of damaging the state budget to the tune of around 530,000 euro per year.
If proven, Zmajlovic could be jailed from one to 10 years for abuse of his position and other misdemeanours.
The complaint follows Zmajlovic's approval for the Ministry for Protection of the Environment and Nature, and other connected agencies, to transfer operations to a private business building in Zagreb.
The story became public when the daily newspaper Slobodna Dalmacija obtained the contract that the Ministry had signed with “Europolis Euro Tower”,which owns the new building.
According to the contract, the Ministry will pay the company 1.78 million euro a year for rent and for maintainance of office space in the skyscraper in Zagreb’s new business zone.
The annual rent and maintenance for the ministry's current premises is 1.28 million euro a year, which includes over 200,000 euro for phone bills for the 500 employees. Phone costs will not be included in new offices.
Before starting the transfer, Zmajlovic claimed the transfer would actually save taxpayers' money, as the rent and maintenance would not cost more than 840,000 euro annually.
Two previous Environment Ministers, Branko Bacic and Mirela Holy, refused to transfer operations to private offices, saying it would be more expensive than rearranging the existing state-owned site.
Bacic told the media that more than 700 state-owned offices were available that would be more affordable, even with rearrangement costs.
Slobodna Dalmacija said it had great problems getting hold of the information about the contract, as the provisions regarding the sums were characterized as “business secrets” and thus protected by law.
Journalist argue that such contracts should not be defined as business secrets, since they concern taxpayers ‘money and thus belong in the sphere of matters of public interest.
They claim use of the provision in this way breaks the Aarhus Convention, which regulates access to information in environmental matters.
