Court confirms: RS Banking Agency is illegally hiding information about Bobar Bank

The District Court in Banja Luka accepted the lawsuit of Transparency International BiH against the RS Banking Agency and found that the Agency violated the Law on Freedom of Access to Information and illegally refused to provide the Final Report on Interim Administration in the Bobar Bank case.

Banja Luka, 31. March 2016 – Transparency International in Bosnia and Herzegovina (TI BiH) has won an administrative dispute against the RS Banking Agency for failing to submit the Final Report on Interim Administration in the Bobar Bank case. TI BiH requested this report, as well as information on actions, from the Agency more than a year ago, and the Agency refused access to information, citing business secrets and protection of commercial interests, after which TI BiH filed a lawsuit against the Agency for violation Law on Freedom of Access to Information.
The District Court in Banja Luka fully accepted the arguments of TI BiH, emphasizing that the Agency, contrary to the Law on Freedom of Access to Information, refused to submit a report, and that it placed itself above the public interest and the Law. The explanation of the verdict states that it is not clear which commercial interests the Agency was referring to, considering that Bobar Bank was already liquidated at that time.

This verdict confirmed the position of TI BiH that the Banking Agency illegally refuses to provide all information that would justify its work as a regulatory body in scandals that have shaken the financial sector of Republika Srpska in the last two . The final report, with an explanation of the implemented measures in the Bobar banka case, should have explained to the public the work of the interim administration after the closure of the bank and clarified the facts about its operations.
There is no legal reason why this report on Bobar Bank would be kept secret, especially since there is a huge public interest, which leads to suspicion that the information is hidden in order to avoid establishing the responsibility of the Agency in this case. TI BiH is satisfied that the District Court ruled in favor of the public, and expects that according to this verdict of the District Court, the Banking Agency will urgently publish the disputed Final Report on the interim administration of Bobar Bank.
Since the beginning of the affair about Bobar Bank, TI BiH has been trying to disclose information about its operations, which the Agency has systematically refused to provide. As a reminder, the Bobar Bank affair dates back to 2014. Instabilities in the financial sector began in 2006, and according to the criminal report of the RS Banking Agency, about ten million marks disappeared from the bank, and a large number of illegal loan agreements were concluded, which is being investigated by the Prosecutor’s Office of BiH. After TI BiH determined that the District Prosecutor’s Office in Bijeljina refused to initiate an investigation, and the Special Prosecutor’s Office determined that there were no forms of organized crime in this case, TI BiH sent a request to the Republic Prosecutor’s Office to resolve the conflict of jurisdiction.

It is high time that investigations in cases related to the collapse of the banking sector in the RS received an institutional epilogue, and in that sense, the responsibility of the Banking Agency must not remain undetermined. In that light, TI BiH welcomes today’s action of investigative bodies and the first arrests of those responsible for criminal acts, but hopes that this case, like many others, will not end in spectacular arrests, but will soon receive an adequate court epilogue.

Press rls – 31 3 2016 doc
Judgment District Court Banja Luka – Banking Agency