The second investigation against the Member of Parliament will proceed.
At the today’s session of the Parliamentary Credentials and Privileges Commission, it was decided that Member of Parliament Tomislav Saucha would be stripped of the immunity at the request of State Attorney’s Office, which has expanded an investigation in connection with the recent affair concerning expenses for fictitious official travel paid while Saucha was chief of staff of the then Prime Minister Zoran Milanović. Saucha’s former party SDP voted against the removal of immunity, reports Večernji List on April 13, 2017.
“I think that we must say certain things. Until now, we have regularly supported each request by the State Attorney’s Office and the Office for Suppressing Corruption and Organized Crime and voted for removal of immunity,” said Darko Parić, vice-chairman of the Credentials and Privileges Commission.
“Last time, Saucha was promptly arrested, spend a few days in prison, and what happened then was telling,” said Parić, alluding to the fact that it was later discovered that the fraud continued well after Saucha left the government. “Today, we will not support the request for removal of immunity. We demand that the State Attorney first concludes the investigation of the initial case. After that, we are ready to discuss the additional removal of immunity,” said Parić. According to the law, immunity has to be stripped separately for each additional new charge.
Ivan Pernar (Živi Zid) said that the State Attorney’s Office did not do a proper job. “I have never seen such a fast removal of immunity. In the prosecutors did a good job, we would not be sitting here,” said Pernar, adding that he would vote against the removal of immunity.
“There is a criminal investigation against Saucha proceeding. We have removed his immunity, two months have passed since then and we do not have any results, in addition to another person now being accused,” said Gordan Maras, who added that they wanted representatives of the State Attorney’s Office to come to give answers to questions.
“I personally think that it is in the interest of Tomislav Saucha for the investigation to be completed so that he can prove his innocence if he is not responsible for this,” said Tomislav Klarić, adding that it was wrong to scrutinize State Attorney’s Office. “There are institutions and we have to believe them. I think that he should remove the immunity,” said Klarić.
The final decision on the removal of immunity will be made by the full Parliament.
