Commercial court ordered on Thursday (March 15) the foreclosure of real estate owned by the construction company Niva Engineering, owned by former Prime Minister Nikica Valentić, because of a 130 million kuna debt (17.3 million euros).

The properties will be auctioned off, according to conditions which the court will decide at a later date. Among the first properties to be put up for sale will be two plots of land in Jastrebarsko, a town 40 kilometres southwest of Zagreb, worth 1.9 million kuna. Other properties include two apartments in Zagreb, worth some 750,000 kuna.

The company’s owner, Niva d.d., was founded in 1995 in Zagreb as a holding company. Former Prime Minister Nikica Valentić, who served from 1993 to 1995 in a Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ) cabinet, was the company’s CEO from 1997 to 2011, before becoming member of its supervisory board in 2015.