Alstom pays former PM’s company almost EUR 600,000 in consulting fees

Budapest, April 26 (MTI) – French engineering company Alstom transferred more than 597,000 euros to a company owned by the family of Hungary’s former prime minister, Péter Medgyessy, in 2007 and 2008, daily Magyar Idők said on Tuesday.

The paper said Alstom transferred 259,000 euros in consulting fees on the basis of a contract with AssistConsult, indirectly owned by Medgyessy and his wife, on March 30, 2007, and another 338,000 euros on January 22, 2008.

Britain’s Serious Fraud Office recently charged the UK head of French engineering company Alstom with corruption and conspiracy in connection with train contracts for the Budapest metro.

Medgyessy later confirmed the report to news portal index.hu, but added that Magyar Idők’s motivation for publishing it was to draw attention away from the dispute surrounding the central bank’s foundations.

“It’s true that my company’s successor had a consulting contract with Alstom,” Medgyessy said. Index quoted the former prime minister as saying that the money transferred to his company constituted revenue after which the firm had paid taxes.

Medgyessy did not deny the size of the reported fee.

Photo: MTI

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters