The Auditor General — who has since been fired — submitted a complaint to the EU’s anti-fraud office, OLAF, which launched an investigation against Medcon & DB Technologies in 2020, the details of which have not been shared with them.
In December 2023, the WDD took over the plant, “due to the inability of the former contractor to produce secondary SRF/RDF fuel, suitable for energy recovery, which has ended up being buried in the cell,” the Limassol Chamber of Commerce wrote in a statement about the dispute.
POLITICO asked the Water Development Department whether they accept responsibility for the ongoing issues at Pentakomo and whether the waste and fuel are still illegally buried today. The department did not respond.
But according to letters sent by Medcon & DB Technologies to the WDD, also obtained by POLITICO, the government knew about the high moisture content before the company joined the project.
“Either deliberately or due to serious professional negligence, these data were not provided to the interested parties,” the company wrote in a letter, dated May 2019.
The letter references a composition study conducted by the Ministry of Interior in 2011 — published on the ministry’s website and since removed — which showed a moisture content of over 68 percent in the waste collected in this area.