Incomprehensibility I invite readers to ‘translate’ the response from the Ministry of Finance on the tax evasion of tax officials on Lider’s website and explain to themselves and me what it could mean.
Indeed, a lot has been published in the media recently about the Tax Administration, and there are even more comments on those articles,’ writes a reader. The same reader wonders why, in all those numerous articles about tax officials, he has not noticed a single commendable one, nor that anyone from the ‘authorities’ felt the need to react to any of those exclusively negative articles, attempted to deny or refute them, explain, mitigate, announce that they would investigate or determine possible responsibility. As a journalist who follows the work of the Tax Administration and the Ministry of Finance, I am used to either not receiving an answer to awkward questions or, if I do receive one, it is difficult to understand. After all, I am conducting a legal proceeding against Ivan Šuker, the chairman of the Supervisory Board of INA and the Minister of Finance, under the Freedom of Information Act due to the withholding of data on public revenues of the state budget from concession and mining fees (e.g., from gas extraction from the Adriatic seabed and domestic oil).
Anonymous Tip about Cover-Up I received an anonymous tip about the cover-up of a criminal offense by Irena Anić, head of enforcement and forced collection, and her husband Šime Anić, a tax inspector at the Tax Administration in Zadar. Vjekoslav Jurlina, the head of the Zadar Tax Administration, is also involved. It concerns an attempt at tax evasion identified by the Internal Control of the Tax Administration of the Ministry of Finance. According to journalistic standards, I sent an inquiry to the Independent Public Relations Service of the Ministry of Finance on the fourth of this month to verify the claims from the anonymous tip I received. After 12 days of hesitation, I received a response on November 16: ‘Depending on the established factual situation, the competent organizational unit of the Ministry of Finance – Tax Administration will take the prescribed measures established by legal provisions.’ I invite readers to ‘translate’ this response on Lider’s website and explain to themselves and me what it could mean. I interpret this response as follows: yes, we have been caught with our fingers in the criminal jam, but we will do everything to hide it because this time the tax was evaded by tax officials – not by taxpayers.
‘Our’ thieves have put ‘our’ tax officials in a small pocket
A reader writes that until recently he was convinced that the Tax Administration consisted of incompetent officials, that it was simply a case of negative selection.
However, in the meantime, he says he has changed his mind and is convinced that tax officials are actually networked and active participants in the plundering of the state budget. The reader emphasizes that in the world, thieves only fear tax officials, and ‘our’ thieves have put ‘our’ tax officials in their pocket.
‘Powerless’ Tax Officials Reader Robert Zenzerović from Istracoma d.o.o. writes that he just covered the enforcement of the Tax Administration with a loan. The reader owed taxes, but he was paying off that debt, keeping it under control, gradually reducing it until a letter with a return receipt arrived from Zagreb – ‘pay within eight days.’ The reader says he is not like, for example, HRT or INA or others whose managers rack up millions in debts – and nothing happens to them. He continues: ‘At the same time, the state is not interested at all in collecting MY claims. When I asked the tax officials why they do not initiate bankruptcy against my debtor, who owes a significant amount to the state, they said they do not have the money to initiate bankruptcy. ‘Okay,’ I said, ‘then I will initiate bankruptcy, but it would be logical for the one who initiated the bankruptcy to be paid first from the bankruptcy estate, right?’ No! ‘You initiate bankruptcy, and then we will collect, then the workers, and then all you others according to some strange order of collection,’ the tax officials replied to this reader. ‘And the costs of bankruptcy?’ the reader asked, to which the tax officials replied: ‘What can we do about it?’ As if the whole system is designed to protect the debtor. And creditors? Again, the tax officials respond: ‘What can we do about it?’
We invite entrepreneurs to present their problems. Following your writings, by pointing out absurdities in individual cases, we will highlight the shortcomings of the system as a whole and thus support Lider readers as individuals in their unequal disputes with the cumbersome state administration. Contact:
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