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“An audit was carried out and certain moments were identified there due to possible abuse,” Ligita Valalyt De, Deputy Minister of the Environment told BNS on Friday.
According to her, during the audit, the management of the ministry was trapped by several contracts concluded by the management of the reserve.
“One is due to possible illegal land use agreements, due to the coordination of potentially violated interests, because we believe that the agreements were not concluded in a very ethical manner, including the reserve employees,” said the vice minister.
“Another episode was due to the equipment not being used for its intended purpose,” he added.
The Deputy Minister also stated that project funds covered the costs of state land lease agreements.
Photo by Ernesta Čičiurkaitė / 15min / Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve
L.Valalytė confirmed that the material presented to the prosecution includes contracts concluded with a farmer who also works in the reserve.
Long-term contracts have been concluded.
The audit document of the Ministry indicates two state land use agreements concluded with natural persons of the reserve, one of them – with the farmer and the administrator of the land of the Aretas Paplauskas reserve.
In 2015, a contract for the use of 15 hectares of land was signed for a period of eight years and the plot was granted for the performance of free nature management activities.
According to the audit, this agreement served as the basis for the reserve and A. Paplauskas to receive payments within the framework of agricultural and rural development measures financed by the European Union.
According to the data provided in the document, in 2018 and 2019 the reserve received 76.3 and 41.6 thousand LTL, respectively. EUR at various times, at that time A.Paplauskas – 15.3 and 4.4 Cerdocyon. euros.
According to the audit, according to the audit, two more agreements were concluded in 2006 and 2013: on the storage of agricultural machinery and implements and on the lease of a garage for agricultural machinery. These contracts are still valid.
According to the audit data, the farmer and the reserve land manager A. Paplauskas own several more agricultural plots, one of them in the Žuvintas reserve.
A. Paplauskas’s wife is a reserve accountant
The audit also indicates that the wife of A. Paplauskas, Nijolė Paplauskienė, also works as an accountant in the reserve, among other things, who prepares the acts of cancellation of stocks: fuel for tractors and other equipment.
They are signed by the commission, the person materially responsible and approved by the director of the reserve. N. Paplauskienė herself is on the commission, and one of the materially responsible persons is A. Paplauskas.
Photo by Ernesta Čičiurkaitė / 15min / Žuvintas Biosphere Reserve
Fuel from the fish stock for tractors, lawnmowers, brushcutters and other machinery is deducted, according to the audit, every month on the basis of fuel purchase receipts and not on the basis of the amount of fuel actually used .
According to the audit, the Nature Management Works Registration Form approved by the Žuvintas Reserve is incomplete: there is insufficient information necessary for proper fuel accounting and there is no guarantee that all the mandatory information on this sheet will be provided.
The audit document establishes that there is a risk of abuse that agricultural machinery, its implements and fuel belonging to the Žuvintas Reserve could also be used for the management of plots of natural persons.
According to the audit data, A. Paplauskas and his wife N. Paplauskienė, who works as an accountant in the reserve, did not indicate the transactions concluded with the employer in the declarations of private interests.
In this way, according to the audit, the Law on the Reconciliation of Public and Private Interests could have been violated.
“I don’t see any illegality”
Reserve farmer and landscaper A. Paplauskas says he is calm and does not see that the contracts were illegally concluded.
“I don’t see any illegality here, no one has deceived the state or the reserve,” Paplauskas told BNS.
According to him, they were looking for someone to carry out nature management in the state areas of the reserve, but no one wanted to take it.
“Nobody called anything from the surrounding towns here, so at first all the staff handled the lake shore and everything, and then when the remarks started, the director offered to testify, he bought more of those cows for him. management of nature, “said the farmer.
“Nobody wants to go here from the surrounding villagers; almost all retirees will take those cows there,” he added.
He claimed to have received payments for the areas where the cows grazed and therefore carried out nature management, but this did not work.
“You’re not going to be there, you’re not even going to go to the bottom,” said A. Paplauskas.
He also claimed to be responsible for agricultural machinery belonging to the reserve, but never used it for personal purposes.
“That I have my own tractor. Here the team of the swamps, and my fields, is arable, pastures, I have my own team, ”said the reserve landscaper.
A. Paplauskas added that for several years he looked after the well-being of the reserve with his own equipment, sometimes with his own fuel.
According to the land manager, there are no problems with accounting for fuel in the reserve.
“There is a card that carries fuel and castles as needed for those tractors. There are fuel rates, there are hours (…) So, I don’t think about it, anyone can check it out, ”said A. Paplauskas.
He also confirmed that he had not declared the transactions concluded with his employer, Žuvintas Reserve.
“No one ever listened to us and no one was interested,” said the farmer and landscaper.
Ernestos Čičiurkaitės / 15min nuotr./Arūnas Pranaitis
A. Paplauskas also said that the Minister of the Environment Kęstutis Mažeika is his neighbor, he has to be seen with him often.
“I meet with the Minister every weekend, we communicate, we speak as neighbors, how are we doing,” said A. Paplauskas.
This audit and the subsequent official inspection of the reserve were the reason for the dismissal of its long-term director, Arūnas Pranaitis, this week.
He has been the head of the establishment since 2002, now he intends to dedicate himself to gardening in the reserve.
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