​PARLIAMENT PROPOSES GOVERNMENT TO CONSIDER POSSIBILITY OF REVISING LAW ON BILLION

The Government was recommended to consider within 60 days the possibility of revising the Law on issuing state bonds for executing by the Ministry of Finance of payment liabilities according to the governmental guarantees of November 17, 2014 and April 1, 2015.

A corresponding decision was adopted by most of MPs at the Thursday’s sitting after the presentation of the report of the commission on investigating the one-billion-dollar bank fraud. According to the decision, it is proposed to consider the possibility to declassify and publish all materials, connected with the stealing.

Besides, the legislature recommended the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) to inquire into actions of ex-Premier Iurie Leanca, during whose rule the first guarantee was given, as well as the then National Bank of Moldova governor Dorin Dragutanu, ex-Minister of Economy Andrian Candu, who was promoting in the Government the idea of providing guarantees, and former Minister of Finance Anatol Arapu.

Presenting the report, Chairman of the investigative commission Alexandru Slusari said that the process of stealing from the banking system was well and beforehand thought, as well as coordinated with politicians and officials, who according to the law were obliged to intervene.

He said that the plan of stealing was implemented gradually since 2011 with the growth of fraud authors’ appetites and the decline of counteraction from the side of state institutions. In 2011-2012 a plan of raider attack on Banca de Economii was already prepared by the grouping of ex-Chairman of the Democratic Party Vlad Plahotniuc and financier Veaceslav Platon for capturing the control package of shares.

“Judges, the National Commission for Financial Market and the National Bank of Moldova participated in implementation of this plan. In the second half of 2012 this process was taking place against the background of Vlad Filat Government’s passivity. The investigation commission on assessing the administration of state-owned shares in BEM, as well as the situation in the banking sphere, headed by Oleg Reidman, had an important role in launching the process of stealing from BEM”, the MP said.

According to him, the NBM leadership also played an important role in stealing in the period of 2011-2014, as it demonstrated passivity, while some of its representatives are still holding their posts – such as Ion Sturzu and Aurel Cincilei. State structures did not take any measures, despite the fact that the National Anti-Corruption Center (NACC) and the Information and Security Service (ISS) have many times informed about risks in the banking system, but they were ignored all the time.

“The actions and inaction of many officials in 2013, which concern the losing by the state of its package of shares in the BEM, including ex-Premier Iurie Leanca, led to deplorable consequences, thus they may be regarded as abuse and negligence. Besides, on November 7-27, 2014, when the Government was deciding the issue with providing governmental guarantee for urgent credit from the side of the NBM worth 9.5 billion lei, three banks were working without special administration from the side of the state. It is in this period that these banks provided 25.5 billion lei of credits only to legal persons”, said the commission chairman.

He said that according to the second report of the Kroll detective agency, the ultimate beneficiaries from the bank fraud are groups of Plahotniuc, entrepreneur Ilan Shor and Filat. Besides, most of information, analyzed by the commission, was available to investigative bodies, but the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) sabotaged the bank fraud investigation in 2015-2019, initiating criminal cases only on some segments without a systemic and holistic approach.

The complete report of the investigative commission was published on the Parliament’s website.