Socialists-Párbeszéd call for parliament probe into Elios case

The allied Socialist and Párbeszéd opposition parties on Monday said they would initiate setting up a parliamentary investigative committee to look into the prime minister’s responsibility in an alleged corruption case surrounding Elios, a company that has been investigated by Europe’s anti-fraud office OLAF.

Speaking at a press conference, Gergely Karácsony, PM candidate of the two parties, called the Elios case “one of the most serious corruption cases of the past 27 years”.

Karácsony insisted that the case showed signs of the use of “organised-crime methods” and that the prime minister’s son-in-law was also implicated in it.

He said OLAF’s report on the case had determined that the Hungarian prosecutor’s office “had been complicit in the crime”. Karácsony said it was clear that Péter Polt, the chief public prosecutor, was unfit to safeguard taxpayer’s money.

He said Párbeszéd would once again submit to parliament a proposal to establish an anti-corruption agency.

Socialist Party group leader Bertalan Tóth told the same press conference that the two parties would on Monday reach out to the other parliamentary parties asking them to support setting up the investigative committee. Under house rules a fifth of lawmakers is required to establish an investigative committee.

Commenting on its handling of cases that have been investigated by OLAF, the Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement that it would not respond to “politically-charged attacks lacking any trace of professionalism”.

“Over the past few days, several politicians have made baseless claims about the cases OLAF has forwarded to the prosecutor’s office, severely violating — in a broad sense — the independence of the judiciary,” the office said. The prosecutor’s office has always carried out its duties in line with the constitution and will continue to do so in the future, too, the statement said.

Source: MTI