The trial of former Deputy Prime Minister Damir Polancec and others in a corruption case dubbed "Spice" resumed on Monday with the testimony of Karmen Antolic, a member of foodmaker Podravka's supervisory board, who did not answer most questions from defence counsel, saying she could not remember because of the passage of time.
The first witness in the trial for an attempted illegal takeover of Podravka said there had never been talk of a hostile takeover at supervisory board sessions, as argued by the defence.
Antolic said she had no knowledge, other than from the media, that the sessions had discussed Podravka's cooperation with the SMS company from Split, which was given a loan by Podravka which it was unable to pay back. She added that she did not remember the loans given to SMS and other companies being presented at Podravka's supervisory board sessions.
At first, Antolic stuck by what she said during investigation, when she stated that the purchase of Podravka stock had never been discussed at those sessions. After defence counsel produced minutes showing that she was present at a session at which the acquisition of Podravka stock was discussed, Antolic said she did not remember it but that it was possible if so stated in the minutes.
Antolic was appointed to Podravka's supervisory board at the government's proposal in 2008. Asked by Polancec's counsel how that was possible since she did not have even one share in the company, Antolic said she did not know and that the question should be put to someone else.
She added that Croatian Peasant Party (HSS) president Josip Friscic had asked her to represent the HSS, of which she is a member, on the supervisory board. Antolic said she did not know what Friscic and the party had thought of the hostile takeover, adding that she represented "institutional investors" on Podravka's board.
The witness could not remember who among the accused had been on the company's management board, if Miroslav Vitkovic and Marin Pucar were HSS members, if shareholders discussed option contracts at a July 2008 assembly, or if a legal opinion on the loans had been adopted at supervisory board meetings.
After the hearing, Polancec said it was telling that Antolic, president of the HSS' Koprivnica city branch, did not know which party Vitkovic and Pucar were members of.
Polancec and several other persons are accused of trying to take over ownership of Podravka with the company's own money, defrauding it of more than HRK 400 million. The other defendants are former Podravka executives Zdravko Sestak, Darko Marinac, Josip Pavlovic, and Sasa Romac, the owner of the Fimi Grupa company, Mladen Horvat, the owner and director of the SMS company, Srdjan Mladinic, and Zagreb lawyer Zoran Markovic.
The trial resumes on Tuesday.
