Djukanovic Told to Give Answers About Telekom Affair

Members of the Telekom affair parliamentary inquiry committee have voted to accept last week's proposal from Andrija Mandic, the committee chairman and leader of the opposition New Serbian Democracy, NOVA.

Mandic said that nine persons, four of whom are former government officials, should be subjected to a hearing as a part of parliamentary probe into allegations of corruption during the privatization of the Montenegrin Telekom company in 2005.

Milo Djukanovic, former Prime Minister and chair of the ruling Democratic Party of Socialists, former economy minister Drako Uskokovic, Veselin Vukotic, former vice-chairman of the Privatization Council, and Branko Vujovic, former chairman of the Tender Commission, are the four former officials who will have to appear before the committee.

Another five persons, including the former heads of Montenegrin Telekom, will be called to give statements.

The first hearings should start as of Monday.

Rasko Konjevic, member of the Social Democratic Party, SDP, was the only member of the committee not to back Mandic's proposal.

The Telekom affair shook the country last December, when the US Security and Exchange Commission alleged that former executives of Magyar Telekom bribed Montenegrin officials and “the sister of a senior Montenegrin government official” with more than 7 million euro in order to facilitate acquisition of the telecommunications company in 2005.

In August, the media reported that a former head of the bank controlled by the Djukanovic family was involved in the affair.