Or at least the attestations of the foreign investors of the King's City casino project don't strengthen the suspicion. According to the attestations, which got possessed by Népszava, the former premier did not give an instruction to either the land exchange nor any concrete step, which is connected to planned investment. Although according to the prosecutor's suspicion Gyurcsány theoretical supporting "showed the character of an order". None of the four investors, who were interested in the casino investment, stated in their attestations that at their meetings Ferenc Gyurcsány gave a concrete order about the project or the preliminary land exchange. However Central Investigating High Prosecution suspects the former prime minister with that. The attestations, which were recorded and officially translated in the course of request of international legal aid, backed up what the former prime minister always said that he had never given an order, just assured a hundreds of billions, employment creating project of his theoretical support at the meeting in the Parliament in May 2008. Although last autumn the prosecution suspected Gyurcsány with abuse of authority after his waiver of immunity, stated that he had "exceeded his powers" when at the meeting his supporting for this project had "showed the character of an order". > With the name of King's City planned investment's preparative chief investor at Hungary was the Israeli-Hungarian dual citizen Joav Blum testified in March of this year that as well he could remember the meeting "they presented the King's City project to the prime minister. The prime minister seemed to be keen from the idea (…) and from the general economy stimulating effect". Blum, who exchanged his lands at Pilis and Albertirsa with the Hungarian National Property  Administration (MNV) Company Ltd to the real estate of the state at Sukoró, also said that: "The prime minister asked the persons present on behalf of the MNV, whether the proposed land exchange was possible theoretically.  From the MNV Tátrai Miklós asserted that there was no theoretical obstacle of the exchange of the allotments owned by me and the real estates  owned by MNV. (…) The prime minister closed the discussion with that the project could be continued with a consideration of the applied rules and on  the ground of the things heard." The three co-investors had similar recollections when on the same day, on 15th of July last year they testified in such a manner that they were sitting with an American attorney in New York, and the questions, compiled by the Hungarian prosecution, were asked by the special representative of the FBI at the American Embassy at Budapest through a video conference. Among the investors the most well-known person is Ronald S. Lauder, the former American ambassador, who is the founder of the Lauder Javne Jewish community school. He had the dimmest recollection of the meeting, but he also didn't mention that Gyurcsány gave a concrete order. "I was there because I thought that it would have helped the Hungarian economy. (…) And I knew it well that Hungary had financial problems, and I thought that with this I could have helped it. I had a restaurant and schools at Budapest, I believed in Budapest, I believed in Hungary" said Lauder. His investor partner, also living in the USA, American-German dual citizen, Fred H. Langhammer answered to the question who decided about acquisition of the land at Sukoro by exchange: "Nobody decided at that meeting. The prime minister said that it should be checked, how lawful, what kind of procedure would occur." The third investor, businessman Itzhak Fisher remembered that the more than one milliard euro investment directly would have created thousands of jobs, and much more indirectly: "We thought a project which had this kind of scale would have been supported by the government. On the meeting the prime minister was talking to the  peoples who were in the room, and asked them, whether casino tender would be soon. And they answered yes. After this he said to us, we had to  go through with the application process, we had to make an offer, which would be compared with the other offers, and hopefully we would win. (…) After this he said the government would keep all the ordinances which should have been kept, and then we would see, whether that was possible or not. (…) The exchange was mentioned on the conference in such a way that Blum was speaking about the idea of exchange (…) the prime minister did not give an order to start the process, just asked what was the course of it." None of the investors mentioned concrete orders, however the suspicion was built on it, although Gordon Bajnai, who was present on the conference, rated it unsubstantiated, said that Gyurcsány acted legally in accordance with the rules at this case. It is interesting that the prosecution was not curious to know, what  the investors negotiated with Viktor Orbán about the investment of Sukoró. As the Népszava brought to light as oppositional leader Orbán met with Lauder several times; at first time in August 2009 at the Gundel restaurant, then in January 2010 at the János Martonyi foreign minister's villa at Szada. It turned out that Lauder initiated another discussion after the elections, but the premier requested him to postpone the meeting. Among others this detail, which was kept secret  by Orbán, would be revealed by the parliamentary committee inquiry which was initiated by the LMP in autumn 2010. But on this the Committee on Constitutional Affairs has been "sitting" for one and a half years, which in the last 19 months had 83 sessions,  Sukoró hasn't yet appeared on the agenda. The case of Sukoró has nine suspects at large, but according to our information not one of them will be accused. Beside Gyurcsány there are two other persons among the suspects, who previously sold their lands at Pilis and Albertirsa to Blum. (The land exchange was annulled by the High Court with a final judgement.) One of Blum's lawyers and one of the appraisers who acted in the series of the land transactions was suspected. Moreover Miklós Tátrai, the former director general of MNV, Zsolt Császy the leader legal advisor of the property administration at that time, Andrea Markó former secretary of the state at the Ministry of Finance and András Váry the director of MNV responsible for the ownership affairs at that time was suspected too.

Resource: Népszava

Last Updated on Wednesday, 11 July 2012 17:39