Photos: Vima Newspaper
Government planes and helicopters made 136 flights to transport ministers and officials for the total amount of 5.8 million euro. A parliamentary question to the Minister of Defence Panos Beglitis made it clear that in this way each VIP flight costs the government around € 43,000 on the average.
The Minster’s reply in turn made it clear that the Greek Air Force held the lion's share in the transportation of ministers and officials. Beglitis confirmed that 134 missions lasting 8644 hours and totaling € 5.8 million were carried out in the last 12 months. "The flights abroad are more expensive than the others due to the costs of compensation of the crew abroad, the landing fees and fees for the stay of airplanes and helicopters at airports in foreign countries," states his reply.
The compensation of the crew amounted to € 122,000 for the specific period, and the landing and service fees (operating activities related to the landing, parking, catering and other expenses) amounted to over € 256,000.
The decision to cede the three VIP airplanes was taken by the Cabinet Secretary while the Directorate General for Economic Planning and Maintenance and the Ministry of Defence and Air Force of Greece is carrying out the implementation of operations. The reply states that the land forces do not have VIP helicopters, but only helicopters for operational needs and offered two Chinook CH-47D for the transportation of the political leadership.
The VIP flights carried out in the period from May 30, 2010 to May 30, 2011 are as follows: Embrer 209 made 41 flights lasting 230 hours and the costs amounted to € 1.6 million; GULFSTREAM performed 36 flights with a duration of 310 hours for the amount of € 2.0 million; LEGASY carried out 43 flights for 272 hours worth € 1.9 million. The helicopter flights are: Augustra B -212 - 2 flights for 2 hours and for over € 20,000, VIP SUPER PUMA - 12 flights for 72 hours worth € 251,884 and CHINOOK (CH-47D) carried out 2 flights for 7 hours worth € 40,164.
The lack of savings by the government is carried throughout the public sector where corruption continues to flourish. Complaints from citizens to the commission on transparency of institutions in Greece related to corruption of public officials increased to 101.8% this year. According to the internal affairs office at the police, the complaints only against police officers have increased to 78.26%.
The chain of employees in the Department of Urban Planning at the Prefecture of the South Aegean and the local police department who are accused of disloyalty to a degree of felony has been broken. The Urban Planning Directorate has "frozen" 157 cases of illegal planning on the islands for which fines were due, but the local tax offices did not register them to be collected. The investigations show that none of the "signals" for the offences in the same directorate is recorded in the books of the local police station and no protocol number is assigned.
Another inspection led to the detention of the head of a surgical clinic at a state hospital for passive bribery. The doctor asked the amount of € 1,200 from the daughter of a patient he had operated. Such is the case of two plastic surgeons also from a state hospital who are also detained with charges of passive bribery, extortion and violation of the law on prevention and suppression of illegal "money laundering". The plastic surgeons asked a patient of theirs to pay the amount of € 2,400.
A doctor accused of attempted fraud was also held in a public hospital. She assured a couple that the hospital in which she worked carries out special tests and asked them to pay her € 1000. After receiving small amounts in advance, she gave the couple the test results. They were in a foreign language and it seemed that they were issued by a laboratory abroad.
An officer in the social security system was also detained for passive bribery. According to the evidence, the officer tried to extort a businessman from the region making plasterboard structures. The officer asked the businessman to pay him 5,700 euro to avoid activity seizure due to debts to the social security.
In the countryside, a municipal employee in the department of research and supervision of construction sites extorted an individual person by requiring different amounts of money to entrust his company the cleaning of public places. The officer was arrested and charged.
Impressive is the case of the detained head of the customs legal department, accused of extortion, abuse of power and continuous passive bribery. He asked a large amount from a businessman to delay by 2 years the inspection of 300 luxury cars, including Lamborghini, Aston Martin, Ferrari and Porsche, imported and sold in Greece by the private company of the businessman. The businessman did not pay an international tax as required by the Greek law and the customs officer required a large amount not to impose numerous fees and fines. Police investigations showed that this is not the only offense of the customs official. He tried to extort other businesses in the field of car sale in the past.
The joint efforts of the relevant departments at the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Interior led to the arrest of an employee of the regional directorate of Ionian Islands. He took € 30,000 to settle the tax affairs of a businessman in the field of hotel keeping in complicity with another employee of that office.