Property of public officials: Who will verify and risk political influence?

The new draft law on this mechanism passed first reading at a Kosovo Assembly session on April 17th, after the preliminary version was overturned by the Constitutional Court.

The Bureau is designed to have separate departments and officials that will verify assets, of which there is a suspicion that they were acquired illegally by public officials.

If property is defined as unwarranted, the bill envisions the seizure of property by the tribunal.

But the way the Bureau will work has raised questions.

Volnet Bugakku, a researcher at the Kosovo Democratic Institute, says in Radio Free Europe's post 5 questions that the Bureau's director is set to be elected with parliamentary majority votes, and to have full competence in launching property verification procedures.

The same director, according to Bugakk, may also decide to stop verifying an official's property by reasoning that there is not enough evidence. This, he considers, can be used politically, as no more justice institutions could treat that wealth.

“No one can dispute that wealth anymore, and this type of mechanism can serve as a mechanism of legitimacy of wealth, potentially if it went to court it might prove illegal”, he tells REL, broadcast Periscope.

Bulaqku claims that in the sense of civil seizure of property, the Bureau will be above other organs of the justice system.

He says there is a contradiction in the law as to the period of verification of property, since, according to him, there is the provision that envisions the verification of property that has been acquired from February 17th 2008, but also the other that says the public official can have property as much as 10 years after the mandate is complete.

“If a public official, if he has suspended his mandate in 2010, the maximum deadline he can verify and seized is 2020”, Bugaq says, clarifying that no banking or tax institution is obliged to store data longer than ten years, which would serve as evidence.

The new bill for the Bureau was conveyed with remarks from the parliamentary opposition, as did the preliminary version, which the Democratic Party of Kosovo had sent to the Constitutional Court. /Periscope/

He went to the first reading what the law for the seizure of the property with which power is being paid.