Šeparović: The Constitutional Court has not discussed Hernadi's lawsuit at all

The President of the Constitutional Court, Miroslav Šeprović, reiterated on Tuesday that the Constitutional Court has not yet discussed the constitutional complaint of MOL leader Zsolt Hernadi, who was legally sentenced in absentia to two years in prison for bribing former Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader.

“The Constitutional Court did not discuss Zsolt Hernadi's constitutional complaint at all. There is no draft decision at any level,” Miroslav Šeparović told the Hina news agency, denying media reports that a decision has been made, but that it has not yet gone through all the formal procedures.

“The Constitutional Court will discuss and decide on this constitutional complaint in the fall, as I stated earlier,” Šeparović repeated in his statement to Hina.

Šeparović previously confirmed that the Constitutional Court rejected Ivo Sanader's lawsuit and added that Hernadi's lawsuit has not yet been discussed and that it will be resolved in the fall.

Sanader and Hernadi were convicted under a verdict of the Zagreb County Court, which was confirmed by the Supreme Court in October last year, because they agreed that for a bribe of 10 million euros they would ensure the conclusion of unfounded changes to the contract related to the Croatian oil company Ina, in which the state has an ownership stake.

These changes to the contract, the Supreme Court pointed out, should have enabled the Hungarian MOL to have a dominant influence over the domestic oil company. They also agreed on the conclusion of a contract on the separation of unprofitable gas operations from the domestic oil company, which will be taken over entirely by Croatia.

The Supreme Court states that Sanader, using his position and authority, ensured that the Government of the Republic of Croatia concluded such contracts which accepted the demands of MOL "set during the negotiations regarding the conclusion of these contracts". Hernadi, on the other hand, secured the payment of 10 million euros to Sanader as a counter-service.

The first conviction in the Ina-MOL case, which was handed down to Sanader together with the verdict for war profiteering, i.e. receiving a commission from the Austrian Hypo bank, was annulled in 2014 by the Constitutional Court, requesting a new trial at the Zagreb County Court.

Sanader has been in prison since April 2019, when the Supreme Court increased his sentence for corruption in the Planinska case.

Source: HRT