Dejan Jovanov, owner of the "Pulse" nightclub in Kočani, now has another case against him. The Public Prosecutor's Office for Organised Crime and Corruption has opened an investigation into him for bribery and has asked the Skopje Basic Criminal Court to order new detention.

The suspicion is as simple as it is serious. According to prosecutors, Jovanov bribed an official at the Ministry of Economy to get him a hospitality licence. Without ever filing an application. And knowing the venue didn't meet the legal requirements.

If the allegations are proven, Pulse's licence wasn't an oversight that slipped past someone. It was paid for. The official who, according to prosecutors, took the bribe has already been charged and is on trial. The law sets a prison term of one to ten years for giving a bribe.

The timing speaks for itself. Jovanov is in detention in the case over the fire, but the legal time limits on that measure are running out - according to his defence, his detention ends on 3 October. The request for new detention reached the court late in the afternoon, two days before that date. Prosecutors justify it by the risk that he will flee and by the fact that he is already on trial for serious crimes against public safety, calling the measure "absolutely necessary".

Prosecutors are still gathering evidence on the bribe. The question hanging over the whole case is bigger than one licence: if one stamp could be bought, who was checking all the other stamps that had to be in place before a nightclub could open its doors?

The fire at Pulse took around 60 young lives, and the trial over it is still going on. The new investigation isn't a separate story - it's another chapter of the same one. If prosecutors are right, the venue's permit wasn't issued by a system that fell asleep, but by an official who was paid not to look. Who else was on that payroll?