At the request of the Prosecutor's Office for Corruption Crimes, the National Transparency Authority (NTA) conducted an audit between 15.06.2021 and 20.06.2021 in the North Aegean Region (Lesvos) to investigate issues related to Community grants, in the framework of a co-funded programme of the Ministry of Rural Development and Food (MDA), concerning the supply of mechanical equipment for the agricultural sector by beneficiary investors.
During the on-site inspection of the Auditors - Inspectors at the Regional Office of the Ministry of Agriculture, irregularities were found in seven (7) of the eight (8) total audited beneficiary investors of the same Region, in accordance with the institutional framework for the implementation of the co-financed programme.
According to the relevant audit report, the findings were:
A. Compliance with the obligation of one beneficiary to accept and facilitate the audits of the competent bodies
Β. In six (6) of the eight (8) beneficiary-investors, the Commission had to accept and facilitate the acceptance by the beneficiary-investors of the application of the following conditions:
- evidence of used or unused equipment
- duplicate engraving of machinery serial numbers or image of the counterfeit marking
- improper representation of dimensions of rainwater tanks
- deviation from the terms of the approval decision for part of the beneficiary's investment
C. proper management by a beneficiary-investor of its investment project.
Recommendations and imposition of sanctions:
For the "used equipment indications" it was recommended by the NTA that the Special Implementation Service of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry as the competent authority for the management of the co-financed Rural Development Programme 2014-2020 should carry out a re-audit.
According to the findings of the extraordinary audit carried out by the competent audit services of the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, the findings of the audit of the NTA are confirmed, for which the imposition of sanctions to the beneficiaries-investors is foreseen by charging the irregular expenditure as undue, except for the indications of used equipment.
A decision has already been issued by the Ministry of Agriculture to recover the entire public expenditure of the aid, amounting to €131.949,75, from the beneficiary who failed to comply with his/her obligation to accept and facilitate the checks, and financial corrections are to be imposed on the other investors to recover the public expenditure of the investments for which a deviation from the conditions of the approval decisions has been established.