Slovak News Back to the news
Kollar: Hayeks Case Was Prepared in Advance to Weaken Coalition
Saturday 25 September 2010 Zoom in | Print page
(Slovak Radio, September 25, 'Sobotne Dialogy')
The much-discussed "Hayeks" case has been prepared in advance and it was aimed at weakening the current governing Coalition, claims Freedom and Solidarity (SaS) MP and head of the Parliamentary Committee for Finance Jozef Kollar. "I'm sure that this was a purpose-built media pressure to weaken this Coalition. I don't rule out that it could also have been led from the inside. The time will tell," he said without stating any details during the Slovak Radio (SRo) politics discussion programme 'Sobotne Dialogy' on Saturday.
Kollar views it as a good sign that Prime Minister Iveta Radicova (SDKU-DS) wasn't misguided by this pressure and didn't initiate dismissal of state secretary Martin Chren or his superior Economy Minister Juraj Miskov (both SaS). This step would mean a comeback of former prime minister and Smer-SD chairman Rober Fico, claims Kollar.
Kollar has no doubts about Chren's activities at the time when he was state secretary and Hayek Consulting, which he used co-own with Most-Hid state secretary Ivan Svejna, was granted a commission by an agency under the remit of the Economy Ministry. "Ethics wasn't violated here, the contract wasn't fulfilled, there was no payment for this contract. Martin Chren took action immediately he leant about it," argued Kollar.
He expressed doubt about the solution presented by Radicova and SaS chairman Richard Sulik on Friday, however. They delegated the Supreme Audit Office (NKU) to look into all contracts concluded between the state and Hayek Consulting during the electoral term of the former government, as various suspicions occurred. If NKU finds that the contracts were inappropriate, both state secretaries will be dismissed. "I assume that the investigation of NKU will pointlessly traumatise this society for another half a year," he added.
According to Smer-SD MP Peter Kazimir, the governing Coalition is doing a cabaret show. "You already have phobias that somebody is imposing pressure on you, together with the media. This is a great beginning after three months (of governing)," said Kazimir.
He thinks that the case showed that Radicova doesn't have a strong position in her Government. First, she declared that this represents an ethical problem, but then she agreed with postponing the solution, Kazimir claims. "NKU isn't an advisory body of the Pope, it doesn't deal with political responsibility," he added.
Smer-SD wants to tell people about this scandal. "I hope you don't think that we'll miss any possible chance to pull the mask from the face of the current Government," he added.
All rights reserved. Any publishing or further dissemination of press releases and photographs from TASR's resources without TASR's prior written approval constitutes a violation of the Copyrights Act.
