Bijelic, Blagojevic interrogated over alleged malfeasance

BELGRADE - Aleksandar Bijelic, former Belgrade city manager, and Marko Blagojevic, former director of the Investment Agency, and five more persons were taken in for questioning before the commercial crime department of the city police on suspicion of involvement in malfeasance in reconstruction of King Aleksandar Boulevard.

They were taken in on Saturday on charges of incurring damage to the Belgrade city budget of over RSD 642 million.

The founders of Balkan gradnja company Nada Cubric and Slavko Bozovic are suspected of making undue profits amounting to RSD 130 million.

Dragan Djilas said at an impromptu news briefing that no one from his team, at the time when he was Belgrade mayor, violated the law.

Djilas said that the indictment in this case is ungrounded since, as he put it, it is impossible to rig tenders for projects which are financed by the European Investment Bank and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development.

The EU granted six million euros for the project of reconstruction of King Aleksandar Boulevard, stressing that this is one of the best projects in Europe financed by the European banks, he said.

Explaining how a local company won the tender, Djilas said that Porr Technobau and Swietelsky Baugesellschaft did not meet the conditions of the tender as they did not have the necessary machinery, while the best bid was submitted by Balkan gradnja, which was approved by the EIB.

Djilas said that people who abode by the law are now being stigmatized by the media, adding that he does expect that Bjelic and Blagojevic will be placed in custody on Monday.

Photo Tanjug, S. Radovanovic