Former Construction Minister Darko Horvat, who resigned on Saturday following his arrest on suspicion of abuse of office, plans to take his seat in parliament, his lawyer confirmed to Hina on Monday.

Lawyer Vladimir Teresak said he was preparing a request to that effect and would send it to parliament as soon as Horvat signed it on Tuesday.

Teresak believes that Horvat might be released soon from investigative detention because he was detained so that he would not interfere with the witnesses.

“Theoretically, if they wanted to, they (the investigators) could question these three witnesses today or tomorrow and he could be released, but that’s up to them,” the lawyer said.

Investigators from the USKOK anti-corruption office plan to interview 11 witnesses, and the defence argue that Horvat cannot exercise his influence on eight of them because they work at the Ministry and he has resigned as minister and can no longer use his position of authority to influence them.

Horvat has been remanded in one month’s detention on the suspicion that in 2018, while he served as the economy minister, he, together with his assistant Ana Mandac, awarded HRK 2.6 million (€347,000) in grants to businesses in which he was personally interested and that that those businesses were not eligible for that aid. Horvat rejected the accusations.