Prime Minister and Smer party chairman Robert Fico on Thursday, June 10, filed a criminal complaint with the Prosecutor-General's Office over a voice recording that allegedly attests to Smer's illicit funding, the TASR newswire was told when Fico left the Prosecutor-General's Office.
Fico is angry about a voice recording that allegedly features him talking about using tens of millions of crowns in Smer's election campaign outside the party's official accounting.
"I've submitted a criminal complaint because what Sme daily published today (Thursday) is a complete fake and an attempt to scandalise the government, the Prime Minister and the Smer party at any rate. You've got to have a nerve to publish such a fake 48 hours prior to the election," said the premier.
He added that he has filed the criminal complaint against the person who made and sent the recording and against the editorial staff at Sme who decided to go public with this recording without having its authenticity checked and without his comments.
Opposition Christian Democrats (KDH) vice-chairman Daniel Lipšic is co-ordinating his moves with SME daily, claimed the premier. "This is because Lipšic delivered the faked recording to the Prosecutor-General (Dobroslav Trnka) before this recording was uploaded on Sme daily's website," stated Fico.
Trnka has declined to comment on the matter as yet. Lipšic said in a parliamentary debate earlier on Thursday that he had e-mailed the recording to the Prosecutor-General's Office on Thursday to supplement a criminal complaint that KDH filed with the Office over Smer's funding on May 20.
According to Sme, Fico boasted in the recording that he had got hold of Sk75 million (€2.49 million) by his own merits. The 65-second recording is said to go back to the run-up to the 2002 parliamentary elections. "I can only say that I've got hold of, and I hope nobody's listening, 35 million for this year, some 40 million for next year, plus some other things as well," Fico allegedly said on the recording.
According to official records, the party received only close to Sk5 million (€165,000) in sponsor funds in 2001 and 2002.
Source: TASR
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
