What have the independent institutions found in Dipos

In the middle of last year, two independent institutions have almost simultaneously been researching the ways in which Dipos operates.
Last April, State Audit Institution was exploring the Dipos enterprise and their disposal of the state’s real-estate.

Last July, media was mainly reporting about just a part of this Audit’s report which referred to unlawful renting of the Dipos’ real estate. The public could only speculate who were the “privileged” tenants, because the policy used by Dipos was not in accordance with the Public Property Law.

To be exact, when renting a real estate, if there were no interested parties among foreign diplomats, Dipos was using its own policy, approved by the Republic Property Directorate. However, this policy wasn’t binding for Dipos to advertise and choose the tenant based on the best offer. The decision on the selection of the tenant was on Dipos director’s to make.

This was the main focus of Anti-Corruption Council, a few months after the Audit’s report was released, in its report on “leasing the state property real estate” which was published last October.

The Council, within its own authorization, has identified then the systemic irregularities and problems, and advised the Government of Serbia to dismantle Dipos.

In the report, the Council published the list of tenants of state villas, apartments and business spaces, where high ranked officers of MUP and BIA also can be found, directors of public enterprises, sport and show-business celebrities; Dipos was leasing real-estate to them for the price drastically below the market value.

There are no precise records about this real estate

However, the public was not so interested about other findings from Audit’s report. One of the findings is that the state still does not possess any precise records about its own properties.

To be exact, according to the information which Audit gathered from Dipos, the number of real estate amounted to 445, while the State Directorate of Property, that is ought to monitor Dipos which uses the property of citizens of Serbia, has stated that Dipos is using 523 real estates in total.

This is why the Audit had concluded that because there are no precise records and no strict control, many oversights emerged and that the state revenues could have been higher.

The report states the case study has shown that a few observed real estates, entrusted to Dipos, had been registered in cadastre favoring Dipos, as well as some other individuals.

Dipos was founded so that State Directorate of Property could lease real estate to diplomats through the enterprise; Dipos is obliged to maintain the state-owned real estate.

However, Audit noticed that the current and investment maintenance had not been conducted, and that the Republic of Serbia had missed an opportunity to increase the leasing income, because some of the properties that required small investment were not ready for renting.

Besides noticing that there is no planned investment, the Audit asserted that only 16 % of the real-estate was leased to accommodate the foreign consular-diplomatic offices, while the rest was leased privately or to the individuals. It is clear that Dipos is an enterprise which conducts business in its own and individual interest using the real-estate of the citizens of Serbia. This can be concluded from the report of independent institutions of our state and also from the advisory body of the Government of Serbia.

Insajder is going to focus in the coming period on every aspect of Dipos’ business conducting.