Balti municipal councilors asked for clarifications on the status of deputy mayor Tatiana Dubitskaya at the extraordinary meeting of the Municipal Council on February 20. It happened after mayor Alexander Petkov canceled her suspension from office, without a new draft decision on her dismissal being presented for voting, IPN reports.
Councilor Cristina Kraevskaya-Derenova drew attention to the fact that, although the draft decision on the dismissal of the deputy mayor was previously rejected, it was not revised and put again to the vote. "What is the status of Mrs. deputy mayor Tatiana Dubitskaya?", she asked.
According to some of the municipal councilors, the order to terminate the employment contract with Tatiana Dubitskaya does not comply with the official and legal norms. Sergei Gramma, another municipal councilor, stressed that the local administration did not present a new draft decision, although the council had requested it at a previous meeting.
In reply, mayor Alexander Petkov said that the situation affects the development projects of the municipality, noting that the municipality of Balti has already lost €600,000 in funding. He said that Dubitskaya is officially his inferior, but she is currently under house arrest, and investigations continue under the coordination of the National Anticorruption Center (NAC).
Tatiana Dubitskaya was detained by NAC officers on January 27 on suspicion of involvement in a number of corruption cases. On January 29, the Ciocana Court of Chisinau City placed her under preventive arrest for 30 days at the request of prosecutors. These explained then that Tatiana Dubitskaya could influence witnesses or commit other crimes if she were released. On February 10, after the court accepted the lawyer's challenge invoking absence of sufficient evidence, she was transferred under house arrest.
The deputy mayor is being investigated for corruption and influence peddling. According to the NAC, the deputy mayor of Balti took bribes of over €200,000 from officials of the mayor's office and from directors of institutions attached to the municipality in exchange for illegal favors.
