Dominic Fritz, accused by ANI of conflict of interest

The National Integrity Agency (ANI) accuses the mayor of Timişoara, Dominic Fritz, of a conflict of interest. According to a press release issued yesterday by ANI, Dominic Fritz would have borrowed money, during the electoral campaign four years ago, from a natural person and later signed as mayor an administrative act in favor of the company represented by the one from whom he borrowed money.

"The assessed person contracted a loan during the election campaign from a natural person. Later, during the exercise of the mayor's mandate, in November 2020, he drew up an administrative act for the benefit of the company represented by the natural person, violating the legal regime of conflicts of interest. Thus, the assessed person violated the provisions of art. 70 of Law no. 161/2003 in conjunction with the provisions of art. 228, para. (1), lit. b) from O.U.G. no. 57/2019", the ANI press release states.

The mayor of Timişoara, Dominic Fritz (USR), claims that the accusations of the National Integrity Agency (ANI) according to which he was in a conflict of administrative interests in November 2020 are "completely unfounded".

In a post on the official Facebook page, Dominic Fritz said: "They made a case for me too. The National Integrity Agency considers that in November 2020 I was in a situation of administrative conflict of interest and proposes to terminate my mandate. Of course, the whole approach is absurd and completely devoid of facts. And I will fight in court all the bizarreness intended to stick a politically stained label on me. It's like Radio Yerevan: they say that I participated in the development of a PUZ for a beneficiary who lent me money - only I didn't participate, he wasn't a beneficiary and he didn't lend me money. An architect developed the technical documentation for a client's PUZ. That PUZ went through all the stages before I became mayor, with the signature of my predecessor. When I took over the mandate, the only thing missing was the vote from the City Council. In order not to include a document signed by the former mayor in the new council, my colleagues asked me in the first days of my mandate to sign once again the approval report that sends the document, without changing a comma, to CL. The architect, who is not the beneficiary of the PUZ as claimed by ANI, but only developed it for a client, without benefiting in any way from his vote or non-vote, is also a USR local councilor. He lent the 2020 mayoral campaign 25,000 lei, an amount of which I personally did not see a single lei and which was returned when AEP returned the campaign money (this is how electoral campaigns are financed in Romania)".

The mayor of Timişoara also mentioned that he will contest the report prepared by ANI in court: "You will hear many attacks in the coming days. I will also challenge the ANI report in court and I have no doubt that I will be right. I will defend my honor and integrity regardless of who has put the stain on me".

The accusation made by ANI against Dominic Firtz comes a few days after he decided to start the steps to obtain Romanian citizenship and the related passport.

Also yesterday, ANI announced that the current prefect of Giurgiu county, Florentina Stănculescu, is in a state of incompatibility starting from November 10, 2022, as she exercised the position of vice-president of a political party simultaneously with holding public office within the Giurgiu County Council, thus violating the provisions of art. 98, paragraph (2) of Law no. 161/2003.