THE ONLY person who responded to the call to act in the case of Jozef Ličko Jr, who is currently unable to leave Chad, was the Slovak president, who sent a letter to his Chadian counterpart, said the organisers of a petition calling for Ličko’s return, which has already been signed by about 1,000 inhabitants of Krupina, Ličko’s home town. Speaker of Parliament Pavol Paška, Prime Minister Robert Fico and head of European Union’s diplomacy Catherine Ashton also received the petition, the SITA newswire reported on February 18.
“The aim of our activity should be to wake up our [state] bodies [so that they] act quickly,” said Ján Macko, one of the organisers of the petition, as quoted by SITA.
Ličko went to Chad in 2012 as an employee of the Slovak HONTstav company, the main subcontractor of the Libyan-Chadian company, Soliinvest. The firm won a competition to build a football stadium in N’Djamena, Chad’s capital.
Last December Soliinvest filed a complaint over HONTstav with the office of the prosecutor in Chad, saying it had doubts over some of the company’s interests. Subsequently, the prosecutor told Ličko not to leave the country until the investigation of the case is over, SITA wrote.
The Slovak Foreign Affairs Ministry also claims it has taken several steps to help the Slovak since learning about the case at the end of November 2012. It now plans to send an envoy to Chad to discuss the situation, SITA wrote.
