Until just yesterday, the Croatian taxpayer thought that they were paying a yearly €300,000 for the Arena Zagreb and its maintenance with the state and Zagreb City Hall splitting the bill. They were wrong.
Maintenance on the Arena Zagreb, according to construction company and owner, Ingra, will cost four times more at €1.2 million.
Before construction started on the largest arena in Croatia, it was announced that the Arena would be cost a total €210 million, paid in 28 yearly installments.
This would mean €7.5 million yearly or €7.2 million for the construction of the Arena and €300,000 each year for maintenance costs, Zagreb Mayor Milan Bandic parroted for months.
Three years after the Sanader cabinet, City Hall and Ingra agreed to a public-private partnership, things are not as Sanader and Bandic had said they would be.
Namely, Ingra is claiming €1.2 million for maintenance in 2010. The construction company and concessionaire claims that the agreement clearly stipulates that maintenance costs will be defined individually each year, as maintenance costs are not the same when the facility is not in use.
‘The €300,000 defined for the first year was the price of maintenance assuming that the Arena would remain unused after the World Handball Championships’, said Ingra spokesman Dank Deban.
Arena Zagreb director, Tomislav Pervan, however, claims that there is no agreement that regulates maintenance costs. Instead, it is estimated that if maintenance in 2009 cost €300,000, then the price for 2010 should amount to 1.2 million.
