Slovak News Back to the news
Fico: SDKU Probably Controlled by Fictional "Postbox" Companies
Wednesday 27 January 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, January 27 (TASR) - According to Prime Minister Robert Fico (Smer-SD), it's quite likely that the strongest opposition party SDKU-DS is controlled by some fictive, no-asset "post-box" companies based in London, managed by directors sitting in tax havens and having accounts with banks in Switzerland or elsewhere abroad.
Fico said at a news conference on Wednesday that he makes such a claim based on new information concerning SDKU's financial background that keeps rising to the surface. Premier Fico added that the money may have been flowing from commissions paid for privatising the strategic property when SDKU was in power between 1998 and 2006.
Fico claims that the owner of SDKU's logo is an English firm headquartered in the same location as Allied Wings, to which the party sent more than half a million euros in 2004. The financial transfer was allegedly made to pay off a loan previously taken to finance the party. Fico sees links between the company and SDKU in one person - SDKU treasurer Igor Kucej, who is CEO of the company's 100-percent Slovak daughter. "We've come full circle ... massive laundering of dirty money to boot," said Fico.
"I didn't expect Slovakia to be the first country in Europe to have a political party that was twice ruling the country and is very likely to have laundered dirty money, using fictive firms in tax paradises and bank accounts abroad," closed Fico, adding that "there's more to come".
Premier Fico says that he will publish more information on SDKU financing in due course. He cited his sources as be reliable, and added that the information is "shocking".
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.
