Official vehicles in the election campaign
The media reports that the Labour Minister Zoran Djordjevic had a car accident while travelling from the pre-election rally in Negotin to the pre-election convention in Kostolac. The report does not specify whether the Minister was in an official or a party vehicle. Although the use of official vehicles for parties purposes operates as the violation of the law, ministries now have the justification for it because the Anti-Corruption Agency has adopted an opinion (https://goo.gl/bsgjEE) whereby ministries are entitled to official vehicle 24 hours a day, regardless of whether it is private or official needs, in July 2016. This opinion is adopted in a response to the letter of Djordjevic's predecessor Aleksandar Vulin, who was interested if he could use an official vehicle for his travels to party rallies “due to security reasons”.
The Transparency Serbia, after it learned of this opinion sent a letter in April 2017, (https://goo.gl/x6xrax) in which indicated to the Agency that it had misinterpreted the regulations and that ministers are entitled to a company car 24 hours a day for official purposes, and without limitation can be used only by the officials listed in the
Decree on Determination of Security Activities for the Protection of Certain Persons and Facilities. The Minister of Labour is not among them. According to the TS, the Agency didn’t adopt a new opinion in the meantime.
Otherwise, in the news of the car accident, it is stated that with the Minister, who was rushing from one election rally to another, were also “his associates”, “assistants”. It is not clear whether it was the minister’s Assistants or the assistants to the party officials. If it comes to the minister’s assistants, it should be noted that according to the law, they should be non-political officials in a position to be elected in the competition, not political officials. However, even if it is a political set acting as minister’s assistant, they have no basis to use the minister's official car to go to a party rally.
