Croatian anti-graft police Uskok confirmed on Tuesday that they had opened an investigation against two unnamed persons, which local media and state news agency Hina nevertheless named as Labor Minister, Josip Aladrovic, and the Mayor of the eastern town of Zupanja, Damir Juzbasic, without citing sources.

According to unsourced speculation circulated in local media, Aladrovic and Juzbasic are suspected of colluding to illegally give two jobs to preferred candidates in the public administration, in 2018 and in 2019. At the time, Aladrovic was head of Croatia’s public pension fund HZMO.

Aladrovic is a member of Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic’s ruling party, the Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), and was appointed to head the labor ministry in a cabinet reshuffle in July 2019.

He was appointed to replaced Marko Pavic at the labor ministry, who was himself moved to replace Gabrijela Zalac at the helm of the ministry for regional development and EU funds, after Zalac had become subject of media allegations of graft. Zalac was later arrested in November 2021 in a European prosecutors’ investigation under suspicion of misappropriating EU funds.

Juzbasic, who used to be a member of HDZ but is now formally an independent officeholder backed by the right-wing party Homeland Movement, is suspected of acting as a middleman through a former official at the ministry of the economy, Ana Mandac, on behalf of one of the candidates for the job.

Mandac was assistant to former economy minister, Darko Horvat, who took over the construction ministry in the same cabinet reshuffle in 2019. Horvat himself was arrested last month in a graft probe and promptly resigned.