The report on the Broadcasting Authority caused a rift in the relations between the Attorney General and the Auditor General, following a remark by George Savvidis that despite Odysseus Michaelides' suggestions of criminal offences, this did not emerge.
Following this development, the Auditor General, Odysseas Michaelides, sent a reply letter to the Attorney General, George Savvidis, in which he appears annoyed with the attitude of Mr Savvidis, referring to the continuous contempt and underestimation of the Audit Service.
In the letter, published today by the newspaper Phileleftheros and sent to Mr Savvidis on April 18, Mr Michaelides refers to the complaints against members of the Broadcasting Authority, stating among other things, that in some cases there does not appear to have been equal treatment of administrative fines imposed by the Authority, referring to the complaint which referred to possible offences of corruption, abuse of power, intimidation, extortion of money through false representations and other criminal offences, directed against two members of the ARC.
The complaint was reportedly accompanied by copies of bank accounts, invoices and other evidence, with the complainant alleging that the two APK members were receiving fees from a private station, either in the form of cash or to cover their own personal expenses, essentially to provide some kind of "protection" to the station.
The Audit Service, as stated in the letter published by Phileleftheros, forwarded the case to the Attorney General of the Republic in late December 2018, who in early January 2019 instructed the police for a criminal investigation. "Based on recent information from the Police, a criminal file was formed for the case, which was forwarded to the Legal Service," the letter says, adding that a month later the Attorney General decided that no evidence had emerged to justify the prosecution of any person.
Ulysses is furious. "We reject its contents in its entirety."
The Auditor General, however, did not stop there as he went on the counter-attack by "firing" at the Attorney General citing his repeated disregard for the Audit Office.
In his response letter, the Auditor General, according to Phileleftheros, first states "e reject in its entirety its contents to the extent that it suggests your assertion that you have any authority or competence to intervene and/or make suggestions or instructions susceptible of compliance to the Audit Service."
It points out to him that it is his right, as it is the right of any other citizen, agency, department or organization to have an opinion that the particular report included in that Special Report was "unnecessary", or that it was "included for no apparent reason", or that it "leaves the impression of an attempt to criticize and attempt to control the decisions of the Attorney General".
However, he emphasizes that no one has the power or authority to demand that any report of his office have the content that he decides, or deems, to be correct, appropriate or suitable.
In fact, he argues in the letter, the Attorney General has on occasion expressed the assertion that he has the power or authority to determine even the content of the reports which the Service will make when called before Parliamentary Committees, "I inform you in advance that, as we always do before the relevant Parliamentary Committee for the Monitoring of Development Plans and Control of Public Expenditure when we are called upon to present our Reports, we will, in this case, keep you fully informed of the case".
"I would like to think I have been sufficiently clear that we reject all of your above assertions that you have such powers or authority. I consider it my highest obligation to uphold the full independence of the institution I serve, especially when it is apparent that someone seems to have the impression that they are some sort of supervisor or hierarchical superior of our Service and that they can instruct it how to exercise its controls, where and when to express opinions, how to inform Parliamentary Committees, and now and what to include in its reports. The independence of the Audit Service has been around since the days of the ancient Athenian democracy, when the idea was born, the quintessence of the institution, and obviously I would be unworthy of the position the state has appointed me to serve if I allowed it to be undermined."
Finally, he described as regrettable that repeatedly, he said, the Attorney General appears to disdain the independence of the Audit Service, noting that "sometimes even using language in a derogatory style and tone, constantly undermining the smooth cooperation between the two Services, which should be at all levels flawless and continuous."
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