The problems and irregularities at Posta Romana were identified following checkups by the inspectors of the Government Control Body who found that the company’s former management had breached the normative acts regarding expenditures and allegedly committed crimes through abuse of office. The inspectors’ calculations revealed total loss of over 485 million lei (EUR109 million) for Posta Romana between 2009 and 2011, people close to the matter told MEDIAFAX.
The report drafted by the Control Body shows that in 2009, 2010 and 2011 Posta Romana’s former management had put into execution the company’s budgets of revenue and expenditure by breaching the decisions of the General Assembly of Shareholders whereby the budgets had been approved and by breaching the imperative provisions of government decisions approving the respective budgets.
The inspectors concluded in the report that the company’s former managers had exceeded the maximum limits of total expenditure approved without observing the legal provisions setting that the level of expenditure must be proportional with the level of revenue. The report also says that checkups revealed “crimes associated with abuse of office against the public interest.”
In May this year, Prime Minister Victor Ponta said he would ask the Government Control Body to check on the situation at Posta Romana and state-run Agency of State Domains following information alleging the two companies are in dire financial straits. Ponta also said at the time that Posta Romana’s former management had lost all trials targeting cases which involved cumulated amounts of RON103 million and the company had amassed debts of RON110 million to tax authority ANAF.
Also in May, then-communications minister Dan Nica said Posta Romana reported loss of around RON500 million over the past three years because it had been “systematically ripped off.”
Posta Romana is the largest postal operator in Romania, with a territorial network of nearly 7,000 post offices.
The Communications Ministry owns 75% of Posta Romana’s capital, while investment fund Fondul Proprietatea owns 25%. (EUR1=RON4.4494).