Officials from AFDJ Galati, suspected of stealing 7 million euros with tugboats

The Lower Danube River Administration (AFDJ) Galati is one of the companies targeted by the searches carried out in Romania, on Wednesday, March 27, by the prosecutors of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, in a file regarding the fraudulent purchase of some tugboats. The estimated damage is around 7 million euros. Two other institutional searches were carried out in Constanța, in the premises of the Romanian Naval Authority.

The suspicions that have been launched against several officials from the River Administration of the Lower Danube Galati and the Romanian Naval Authority are related to a series of purchases, more precisely to the way in which the specifications were drawn up for the purchase of two tugboats for the sector river of the Danube Delta. According to a press release from the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, the investigation would involve the carrying out of 12 searches, three of which were in institutional premises, which were carried out on Wednesday in Galati (one) and Constanța (two). The investigators also targeted seven home addresses of the suspected officials, as well as the headquarters of two private companies.

According to the information made public by the investigators after the searches were completed, “public officials from AFDJ Galați, as its representatives, obtained European funding through the Large Infrastructure Operational Program (POIM) for the purchase of two multifunctional tugboats. This was the result of a contract of public procurement launched in September 2019, in the total amount of 35,144,000 lei, approximately 7 million euros”, announced the prosecutors.

The “mistake” that the initiators of the project would have made would have consisted in presenting inaccurate documents to ensure that they would receive the funding. More precisely, the tender specifications would have been drawn up based on the more restrictive technical characteristics and construction requirements specific to maritime vessels, although the tugs to be purchased were intended exclusively for river navigation. Under these conditions, the number of bidders who could meet the conditions specified by the AFDJ was very limited, the restrictions preventing other economic operators from participating in the bidding procedure and ultimately favoring a single candidate.

Tugs, impossible to use in the Delta

Following the completion of the contract with the supplying company, the two tugs were delivered in July 2021 with a higher draft than originally provided for in the tender specifications and the purchase contract. This would have made them exclusively adapted for the maritime Danube, where the depth of the water allows navigation with a greater draft. The two boats could not be used for river navigation, the original destination of the tugboats, because they could not transit the full reservoirs of the river sector of the Danube, the statement of the European Prosecutor’s Office also states.

This situation would have caused damage to the EU budget in the amount of approximately 7 million euros.

In Wednesday’s searches, from Galati, police officers from BCOO Galati, DGA Galati, fighters of the Service for Special Actions and Gendarmerie Galati were mobilized.