ZAGREB, January 5, 2019 – The Zagreb city government said on Friday that the daughter of Mladen Mađer, an MP accused of political corruption after leaving the Croatian Peasant Party (HSS) to join Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandić’s party, was hired by the city government last year, while the USKOK anti-corruption office would not say what they were doing about this case, but confirmed they were conducting a preliminary investigation.
The city government told Hina that Tajana Šimunić was hired as a senior associate on October 1 last year after replying to a job ad.
USKOK spokesman Vuk Đuričić told Hina this office had begun a preliminary investigation into alleged political corruption after HSS president Krešo Beljak pointed to possible wrongdoing.
Beljak told the media he began suspecting corruption when Mađer said he had to think about himself and his future.
After the city government said it had hired Mađer’s daughter, Beljak told Hina today there had to be more to this story. “A job isn’t a good enough reason for what Mađer did.”
The HSS said earlier that about ten days before Mađer joined Bandić’s party, they suspected something like that would happen because they had information about allegedly serious acts of corruption. “Therefore, HSS president Krešo Beljak personally reported the whole case to USKOK,” the party said.
Bandić’s BM 365 Party of Work and Solidarity won only one seat in the national legislature in the September 2016 parliamentary election and Mađer is now the 13th member of its parliamentary group.
The ruling HDZ party has said MPs are leaving their former parties for Bandić because of the poor situation in the opposition ranks, while the parliamentary minority says voters are being deceived and that this proves that election legislation is bad.
More news on the Zagreb mayor can be found in our Politics section.
