Former Mayor of Kozarska Dubica Sold Stolen Electricity to Elektroprivreda RS

(Patria) - The company “Titanium Power“ from Kozarska Dubica, owned by Radenko Reljić, the former mayor of this municipality, has been stealing electricity for months, which it later returned to the system, claiming it was produced by a solar power plant, portal Capital has learned.

According to them, Reljić’s company lost its right to incentives for electricity from renewable sources due to this criminal offense and other malversations.

The company „Titanuim Power“ was recently subject to an extraordinary inspection by the Energy Regulatory Commission (RERs), which decided at a session held on Thursday, December 11, to revoke the company’s certificate.

Due to all of this, Reljić’s facilities will soon be disconnected from the grid, and the police and prosecutor’s office have already been informed of this case.

The reason for the inspection was the alarming data that “Titanium Power’s” power plants were producing twice as much electricity as they were designed for.

As they learned, the power plants were inspected last week, and a kind of “raid” was carried out without prior notice, so that evidence could not be hidden, reports Capital.

Even the employees of „Elektrokrajina“ were not aware of the inspection, and they were called by the Energy Regulatory Commission for intervention, but they were not told why they were engaged until the last moment.

Impossible to Produce Such an Amount of Electricity

A well-informed source says that Reljić installed additional equipment and installations at his power plants.

“Electricity was stolen from the power grid, it passed through the meters of the power plant, and then it was returned to the grid as electricity produced by solar panels,” a well-informed source told Capital.

He also adds that one of the power plants was disconnected for a year, and it was still showing production.

This is confirmed by the on-site report that Capital had access to.

“The situation found indicates that at all relevant locations, there was incorrect registration of electricity production with unknown electrical equipment through which electricity was taken from the distribution network and then directed through a transmission meter, which therefore registered a significantly larger amount of electricity that could not have been technically achieved in the production facilities,” it states.

Due to suspicions of fraud, the police and the competent prosecutor’s office have been informed of everything.

RERs states that the reported annual electricity production in all production facilities owned by “Titanium Power” is significantly higher compared to the planned production, i.e., the one approved for it.

“It is known that at this geographical longitude and latitude, considering the climatic conditions and the amount of solar radiation, it was not technically possible to produce anywhere near the registered amounts of electricity in the disputed period in each of the production facilities with the equipment and installations listed in the decisions on certificates and decisions on approving the right to incentives,” they state.

They confirm that they have determined unauthorized consumption, as well as that they found damage to the main line and inverter, and found equipment that affects measurement.

“This indicates that this business entity knowingly carried out illegal activities with the aim of achieving and reporting significantly higher electricity production, and thus achieving illegal property gain,” states the RERs decision.

Reljić: We Produce, We Don't Steal

In a conversation with Capital, Reljić denies any illegal activities. He says he has eight power plants, five on the roof and three on the ground, and that they are all connected in accordance with regulations.

“It is impossible for a power plant to steal electricity, it produces it and pushes it into the grid,” says Reljić.

However, he reveals that one meter was removed and taken for calibration, but adds that it was sealed.

“That’s why the police were there, because they have to come, those are the rules,” says Reljić.

He adds that a voltage stabilizer was also seized because it was not in accordance with the rules and regulations.

“Everything was in order, except for some damage to the cables. Nothing was done outside the law,” concluded Reljić.

Incidentally, according to data from official registers, Reljić’s company experienced a real business revival last year with revenues exceeding 245,000 marks and a profit of 108,830 KM.

It was the best year since the company was founded.

For example, in the period from 2015 to 2023, revenues were between 60,000 and 100,000 KM, and profits ranged from 25,000 KM to just under 43,000 marks.

Reljić was the mayor of the municipality of Kozarska Dubica from 2016 to 2024, representing SNSD, from which he was expelled in 2021.

He was under investigation by the prosecutor’s office for a long time on suspicion of abuse of position worth 800,000 marks, during his time as director of the Health Center, before he became mayor. The report was later dismissed.

Capital also wrote about him in 2020 when, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, he founded the company “RVRD Company” with several other partners, which built a residential and commercial building in the center of this local community.

At that time, the director of the Health Center, Vlado Karagić, and his wife Milica, the director of the “Mlječanica” spa, Dragan Brdar, and Smilja Jevrić-Topić, the wife of Rodoljub Topić, Executive Director for Economic Affairs at “Elektrokrajina”, entered into business with him.

Reljić later withdrew from the co-ownership of this company.