In the report on yesterday’s meeting between Milorad Dodik and Viktor Orban, one of Hungary’s leading independent media outlets Telex.hu referenced a recently published study by Transparency International in BiH about the construction of Solar Power Plant Trebinje 1.
While Dodik and Orban discussed “strategic projects in energy and agriculture,” Telex reminded that these projects are being implemented under a veil of secrecy, which TI BiH has repeatedly pointed out.
“Although Dodik did not specify which strategic projects would be discussed, they will certainly have plenty to talk about – especially since, after years of legal disputes, the Transparency International office in Bosnia and Herzegovina recently received previously confidential documents related to one of the planned Hungarian investments. These documents reveal numerous irregularities in the concession for the construction of the Trebinje solar power plant,” states the Telex article.
The Hungarian investor LUGOS Renewables (LREN) owned by businessman Roland Lugos was brought into this project without a public tender because a legal provision was used to award the concession to Elektroprivreda RS as a strategic company.
However, the concession was soon transferred to the newly established company SE Trebinje 1, which was then handed over to the Hungarian investor. The new concessionaire had to have financial and technical conditions to build a project worth over 100 million KM, but documentation that TI BiH obtained after a lengthy legal battle reveals that this company had no qualifications.
A written statement from the director of “SE Trebinje 1” stating that the equipment would be procured was sufficient, and the RS Concession Commission determined that a newly established company with three employees and 800 KM in revenue had the conditions to implement a 100 million KM solar power plant construction concession.
The project has not yet been implemented, and meanwhile, problems have emerged in the operations of Roland Lugos’s key company. In Hungary, the liquidation of his company Optimum solar ZRT, which was one of the largest players in the solar energy market, was ordered. LUGOS Renewables, which entered the Trebinje solar power plant construction project, is significantly smaller than Optimum solar ZRT, recording a loss of about 2.3 million euros in 2022, while the number of employees decreased from 22 to just 3 workers.
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