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Zagreb - The government will have to say what it plans to do with Fortenova as the successor to the failed Agrokor conglomerate, the chair of the parliamentary Justice Committee said on Wednesday, and he also expects answers on the State Attorney's Office's (DORH) responsibility for the expert evaluation.
"Somebody enabled Agrokor to become a state within a state. The consolidation process from 2017 was undermined with the appearance of the Borg group. The government will now have to provide some answers, and I hope we will also get answers as to who was responsible for the embarrassment with DORH's expert evaluation," Mišel Jakšić said at the committee's session on the former food and retail conglomerate. The Borg group was in charge of the Agrokor takeover.
Jakšić said he did not agree that Fortenova was just a private company because, he noted, it employs a lot of people, has a lot of land and water sources as well as associate companies.
The session was prompted by the High Commercial Court's decision that an expert financial evaluation, a key piece of evidence against former Agrokor owner Ivica Todorić et al, was inadmissible. The €1.3 million evaluation was done by the KPMG company, which was in a conflict of interest as it was also working for DORH and Agrokor.
The session was also prompted by the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes' acceptance of Todorić's suit against Croatia for the takeover of Agrokor.
State Attorney-General Zlata Hrvoj Šipek and Justice Minister Ivan Malenica attended the session, while Economy Minister Davor Filipović, and Foreign Minister Gordan Grlić Radman did not, with ministry officials attending instead.
Independent MP Karolina Vidović Krišto asked why Prime Minister Andrej Plenković and former economy and finance ministers Martina Dalić and Zdravko Marić were not invited, saying they were "tied to this crime." She asked Malenica why Dinko Cvitan, the state attorney-general at the time in question, was not indicted.
Malenica said the judiciary was independent and that it would be unheard-of for him to get involved.
Peđa Grbin (SDP) said Todorić was not "the good guy" in the Agrokor story. Dalija Orešković (SSIP) said that was irrelevant and asked if Todorić's assets were seized legally.
Grbin said everything should have been solved by amending the law in 2017 and that Croatia would not be in an unfavourable position now if the investment dispute was being handled by a domestic court.
He said it was in the public interest for Hrvoj Šipek to say which one of her deputies was investigating why the financial evaluation was dismissed. She would not say the name to prevent the deputy from coming under pressure.
Vidović Krišto said there would have been no problem had the Market Competition Agency and DORH done their job. "The consequence is monopoly and destroyed Croatian villages and agriculture."
The law on emergency administration in companies of systemic importance, dubbed Lex Agrokor, will back Todorić's claim that the Agrokor takeover was hostile, Orešković said, adding that generations of Croatian citizens would be paying him back.
"In order to cover up the whole case, Croatian institutions have been dismantled and both DORH and USKOK (anti-corruption office) shaken," she said.