Individual failure behind information leak on President Kiska

The information leak on the tax situation of the company co-owned by President Andrej Kiska, KTAG, was not caused by a systemic error on the part of Financial Administration, but rather by the failure of an individual, Financial Administration President Frantisek Imrecze said on November 6.

“I really don’t know how these individuals were motivated into resorting to the offence of violating tax secrets. I regret that things like this happen in our society,” Imrecze said, as quoted by the TASR newswire

Tax officials very quickly narrowed down a group of people who checked the president’s files through the information systems, he added.

Eco Minister also involved

“The same procedure was followed when examining the case of Economy Minister Peter Žiga,” Imrecze continued, as quoted by TASR. “We’ve also identified a close circle of people within the systems.”

A criminal complaint has been filed in the president's case and one should follow in Žiga’s case as well.

“I still believe that 99 percent of the Financial Administration staff carry out their duties in a fair manner and respect tax secrets,” Imrecze noted, as quoted by TASR. “We’re actually talking about an individual failure. We’ll do our best to investigate it. It’s very difficult in the case of a physical leak when somebody copies something and passes it on to somebody else.”

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The tax authority found out in late 2014 that the KTAG company applied for an illegal VAT refund of €146,000 for April 2014 from costs totalling over €770,000. Kiska is the co-owner of the company and was one of its legal representatives at the time.

Meanwhile, a company called Taper, in which Economy Minister Žiga is a shareholder, is being investigated by the tax authorities over suspect deals involving timber, according to the Trend weekly. Taper is in danger of having to make an additional payment of some €340,000 in VAT.

7. Nov 2017 at 13:26 | Compiled by Spectator staff