Trade Committee refutes Commission allegations

The Trade Committee does not feel that the authorities have exerted pressure on Competition Commission members. The parliamentary committee also concluded that the independent body’s work had not been jeopardized. Trade Committee refutes Commission allegations A committee session was called after information had appeared in public that, because of the Delta case, certain ministers were threatening the Commission president. According to Commission President Dijana Markovic-Bajalovic, the Commission was not an instrument for political one-upmanship. “Certain ministers’ comments were political point-scoring and we will not allow it,“ Markovic-Bajalovic told MPs yesterday. For almost three hours, the Committee discussed the alleged threats and pressure that Commission members had been receiving. The Commission president said that they would not allow individuals to turn the body into a means of political point-scoring, and that every decision taken was based on facts and evidence. She qualified certain ministers’ outbursts as a form of pressure. “It’s inappropriate for an economy minister to say in public that he feels that the people who sit and work in the Commission aren’t doing their jobs, and should quit if they don’t know how to do them. I would ask that minister to please come to the Committee and say who he was referring to, and what this conclusion was based on. It’s also inappropriate for other ministers to publicly, via the media, set the Commission certain tasks,“ she said. The other Commission members also made their feelings known to the Commission concerning the alleged threatening messages that certain government members had been sending through the media. Commission member Cedomir Radojcic asked for a definition of threats and pressure to be clarified for him, so that he could answer the question clearly. “If you’re asking me if there have been threats, I can, by elimination, say no. Have there been telephone calls with people asking me to vote for, against or whatever, or whether something similar will happen, obviously not. Surely you don’t think threats work like that, do you? A threat, or as we’ve already said, pressure, exists in the atmosphere that’s created,“ said Radojcic. The government’s only representative at the meeting, Deputy Trade Minister Dragan Penezic, announced changes to the Law on Competition, thus strengthening the Council’s position. He denied threats had been coming from ministries. “(Anti-Corruption) Council and Commission members can correct me if I“m wrong, but I think, where comments in the media by Trade and Services Ministry representatives are concerned, I don’t think anything has ever been said against the work or any person working at the Council or the Commission,“ said Penezic. Christian Democrat Party President Vladan Batic, who, though not a member of the Committee, had the right as an MP to attend the session, and presented two studies that, he claimed, Delta had bought from the Faculty of Law and the Chamber of Commerce to refute claims of monopolism. Batic asked the justice minister to look into dismissing the Supreme Court judges that had heard the company’s case. “Criminals are becoming much more skillful. They’ve become more subtle, more devious. If someone keeps questioning a body and its members, calling them dilettantes, halfwits, belittling them in various ways, discrediting them, ignoring and offending them, of course they are entitled to view it as a form of pressure and threat,“ said Batic. The Committee session was called after a Liberal-Democratic Party initiative to form a focus group to look into the way Delta did business. Parliamentary Speaker Oliver Dulic said that he would take the decision to form such a body after the Committee’s session.

Trade Committee refutes Commission allegations

A committee session was called after information had appeared in public that, because of the Delta case, certain ministers were threatening the Commission president. According to Commission President Dijana Marković-Bajalović, the Commission was not an instrument for political one-upmanship.

“Certain ministers’ comments were political point-scoring and we will not allow it,“ Marković-Bajalović told MPs yesterday.

For almost three hours, the Committee discussed the alleged threats and pressure that Commission members had been receiving. The Commission president said that they would not allow individuals to turn the body into a means of political point-scoring, and that every decision taken was based on facts and evidence.

She qualified certain ministers’ outbursts as a form of pressure. “It’s inappropriate for an economy minister to say in public that he feels that the people who sit and work in the Commission aren’t doing their jobs, and should quit if they don’t know how to do them. I would ask that minister to please come to the Committee and say who he was referring to, and what this conclusion was based on. It’s also inappropriate for other ministers to publicly, via the media, set the Commission certain tasks,“ she said.

The other Commission members also made their feelings known to the Commission concerning the alleged threatening messages that certain government members had been sending through the media.

Commission member Čedomir Radojčić asked for a definition of threats and pressure to be clarified for him, so that he could answer the question clearly.

“If you’re asking me if there have been threats, I can, by elimination, say no. Have there been telephone calls with people asking me to vote for, against or whatever, or whether something similar will happen, obviously not. Surely you don’t think threats work like that, do you? A threat, or as we’ve already said, pressure, exists in the atmosphere that’s created,“ said Radojčić.

The government’s only representative at the meeting, Deputy Trade Minister Dragan Penezić, announced changes to the Law on Competition, thus strengthening the Council’s position. He denied threats had been coming from ministries.

“(Anti-Corruption) Council and Commission members can correct me if I“m wrong, but I think, where comments in the media by Trade and Services Ministry representatives are concerned, I don’t think anything has ever been said against the work or any person working at the Council or the Commission,“ said Penezić.

Christian Democrat Party President Vladan Batić, who, though not a member of the Committee, had the right as an MP to attend the session, and presented two studies that, he claimed, Delta had bought from the Faculty of Law and the Chamber of Commerce to refute claims of monopolism.

Batić asked the justice minister to look into dismissing the Supreme Court judges that had heard the company’s case.

“Criminals are becoming much more skillful. They’ve become more subtle, more devious. If someone keeps questioning a body and its members, calling them dilettantes, halfwits, belittling them in various ways, discrediting them, ignoring and offending them, of course they are entitled to view it as a form of pressure and threat,“ said Batić.

The Committee session was called after a Liberal-Democratic Party initiative to form a focus group to look into the way Delta did business. Parliamentary Speaker Oliver Dulić said that he would take the decision to form such a body after the Committee’s session.