The Conflict of Interest Commission decided on Tuesday to launch proceedings against Finance Minister Zdravko Maric due to his possible bias in a vote on a loan awarded to a company owned by businessman and his friend Josip Stojanovic Jolly and due to the possibility that he accepted a gift he was not supposed to accept.

The rapporteur in the case, Aleksandra Jozic-Ilekovic, said that Maric did not exempt himself in his capacity as Finance Minister and chairman of the Croatian Reconstruction and Development Bank (HBOR) Supervisory Board from the vote whereby Stojanovic’s company Olympia Vodice was granted an HBOR loan to build a hotel.

Jozic-Ilekovic said that proceedings in the case were being launched due to a possible violation of the Act on the Prevention of Conflict of Interest because Maric did not exempt himself from the vote even though he had made it clear in several interviews that Stojanovic’s was his close friend.

Proceedings against Maric were launched also because the Commission needs to determine if Maric, who was seen with Stojanovic at a Croatia-England match at the 2018 world football championship in Russia, had bought the ticket to the match or the ticket was an unlawful gift.