Prosecutor's Office of BiH Investigates Ties to Lijanović Family, While Bavrka Builds a Cow Farm in Novi Travnik!

The Prosecutor's Office of Bosnia and Herzegovina continues its investigation into millions in criminal activity within the entity commodity reserves, after directors Tončo Bavrka and Dragan Vučković were questioned, the BH news agency Patria (NAP) has learned.

Both institutions jointly owe the state close to 12 million marks in unpaid VAT, but, as we have learned, the criminal activity in these institutions is even deeper, and investigators are, in fact, uncovering new branches every day.

Although Bavrka claimed after being questioned that he was at the Prosecutor's Office of BiH as a witness, the Patria agency has learned that prosecutor Oleg Čavka, who is leading the case, will check his role in the millions in criminal activity involving the Široki Brijeg tycoons, the Lijanović family.

Namely, there are indications that Bavrka is linked to the entire chain of multi-million manipulations that have caused great damage to the state. Investigators, as we have learned, are particularly interested in why and how Bavrka started building a new cow farm in Rastovci near Novi Travnik last year.

Namely, according to documents obtained by the Patria agency, Bavrka, or rather his company Agricultural Cooperative "Terra", received more than seven dunams of state land for use from the Municipal Council of Novi Travnik in September last year, for the purpose of "construction of an agricultural property - a cow shed at the Čamića Brdo location".

For this, Bavrka had to pay rent in the amount of 43 thousand marks. Bavrka was previously involved in cattle breeding, but it is clear that last year he decided to expand his business. Investigators are also interested in the fact that Bavrka is entering the same business that the Lijanović family runs. And the Federal Directorate of Commodity Reserves allowed them to accumulate a debt of 1.5 million marks for the storage of canned food.

Namely, Lijanović's company "Farmko" had a contract for the storage of canned food from commodity reserves. However, in 2011, an inspection found that there was no goods in the warehouses at all, and that the Directorate was regularly paying for both the reserves and their storage.

Bavrka initiated legal proceedings for collection, but the question is how it was even possible to conclude a contract without checks and accumulate such a large debt. According to the latest data, the company Farmko from Široki Brijeg owes more than 3.4 million marks for VAT.

In addition, Bavrka, apparently, turned a blind eye to the "disappearance" of fuel from the company "Zovko-Oil", to which the Directorate paid for the storage of commodity reserves of diesel and gasoline, and the dispute is worth six million marks. It was also discovered that the company "Zelena dolina" from Stolac cashed in about a million marks for storing wheat, which, upon inspection of the warehouses, was not there at all, reports NAP.