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Dzurinda Urges Fico to Respect Opposition's Right to Nominate UVO Chief
Thursday 18 February 2010 Zoom in | Print page
Bratislava, February 18 (TASR) - Opposition parties SDKU-DS, the Christian Democrats (KDH) and the ethnic-Hungarian SMK have written a letter to Prime Minister Robert Fico urging him to respect their right to nominate a candidate for the post of chairman of the Public Procurements Office (UVO), SDKU leader Mikulas Dzurinda told a press briefing on Thursday.
"I want to believe that he (Fico) meant business when he said that the post belongs to the Opposition," said former two-time premier Dzurinda.
The five-year term of current UVO chief - Bela Angyal, who was nominated by SMK but later switched to the Most-Hid party - is set to expire on March 10, with the new UVO head due to be appointed by the Government.
Dzurinda noted that when Government-run tenders set off opposition criticism of overpricing, Fico responded in a "rather cynical manner" and kept pointing out that Angyal is an opposition nominee.
According to Dzurinda, however, Angyal has failed in his post. This can be observed, for instance, in his evaluation of reservations regarding the electronic road-toll system.
"I have no idea as to why Mr. Angyal began to collaborate with the Government, why he's obfuscating such scandalous tenders as the toll tender. I have no idea what happened. Far be it from me to speculate on whether trafficking was involved. Something did happen, though," said Dzurinda.
If the premier does respect the Opposition's right to nominate the UVO head, added Dzurinda, SDKU already has a candidate up its sleeve, and this person is capable of running UVO in a better fashion than Angyal.
"We aren't insisting that it must be a SDKU-DS nominee, though," he said, adding that the three opposition parties will reach an agreement on a joint candidate without delay.
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