While an investigation is underway in the previous cases of the Kispest municipality due to the suspicion of numerous crimes, the protagonists of the scandal have won more and more jobs in the past two years thanks to the left-wing district administration. One of the companies, stuffed with public money, was previously managed by an MSZP municipal representative, and the owner of another winning business company is a Spanish neighbor of the MSZP politician Krisztián Kránitz, who gained a dubious national reputation due to the Kispest scandals. But a company also wins regularly, because of which even the left-wing press jumped on Mayor Péter Gajda, reports Magyar Nemzet.
In Kispest, the participants in previous corruption and drug-related cases continue to work for the local government or for the local government. The protagonists of the scandal, such as Csaba Lackner, retained their seats as representatives. Krisztián Kránitz, the MSZP politician referred to only as Krinyó in the audio recordings, and the former head of the Kispest asset management technical organization (Vamüsz), has received a new appointment, and is now the second person in the district's largest self-governing organizational unit. And the straw men who emerged in the scandal continue to mow. The only difference is that instead of billions, now there are only tens of millions, reports Magyar Nemzet.
It is worth noting that the cases of suspected corruption in Kispest became public when Magyar Nemzet and Hír TV received a recording of about fifty hours of conversations from an informant. Details of the audio materials were published in October 2019, the conversations were recorded in the summer of that year. On these mainly Csaba Lackner XIX. district MSZP municipal representative talked about how he and his colleagues stole public funds. According to his famous phrases, he is a "stupid" who does not earn a hundred million forints a year in local politics. "The money doesn't have to be taken from the budget, it comes back from outside contractors," said Lackner, who then shared several details. During the conversations, the parties, as they put it, "absorbed stripes". Csaba Lackner used his bank card to arrange white powder in a video recording. Despite everything, he has retained his seat as a municipal representative to this day.
The business of the MSZP representative
Anildia Kft. was previously the company of Lászlóné Somogyi's MSZP municipal representative in Kispest. The lady's ex-husband, László Somogyi, has been managing and owning the business since 2013. Over the years, the Fidesz opposition in Kispest has criticized the MSZP representative's company for spending hundreds of millions on public procurement and municipal works, but Péter Gajda cynically swept the problem under the carpet.
Csaba Lackner reported on one of the dirty deals in the famous audio recordings that he and Somogyi shared HUF 12 million, which they did not want to give to Krisztián Kránitz. "[…] at the last moment, Somogyi figured out that he still wants to get a job for himself, and we will give Kránitz the money anyway. At the last moment, I took the millions out of my pocket and, damn it, we gave it to him," said Lackner, who also complained to the mayor, because according to his claim, Péter Gajda "only got three" while Kránitz got 12 million forints.
In August 2020, less than a year after the outbreak of the scandal in the fall of 2019, Anildia won work in the district again: it was able to renovate the municipal office building located at Templom tér 8 in Kispest for a net value of more than HUF 25 million.
Somogyi's other company also won
"The Lacies of Somogyi are renovating the health care facility […]," Lackner said in one of the recordings. The wording was interesting because the transformation of the Kispest Health Institute was carried out by a business company, Compassion Kereskedelmi és Szolgáltató Kft., apparently completely independent of the contractor. However, Lackner also reported that László Somogyi represented Compassion in official meetings during the renovation of the health institute. Remember: when our newspaper asked for a telephone contact for Compassion, which has its headquarters in Hamvas Irodaház, we received the name and telephone number of László Somogyi from Stróman. Since 2013, the company has won eleven high-value public procurements in the XIX. district, ten of them after September 2015. The total value of the works exceeds HUF one billion. In June 2020, the company won another job, again in the Kispest Health Institute, the task was to design a blood collection room on the ground floor worth more than HUF 52 million net.
Lackner's old friend also works for him
Apcoa Kft. won seven smaller jobs in Kispest between September 2020 and February 2021. The use of Apcoa is also shocking because the left-wing press also attacked Mayor Péter Gajda due to the appearance of the company in the public procurements of Kispest. In connection with Apcoa, which is also involved in the parking business, headlines appeared in the left-wing media that referred to "Fidesz-MSZP mutyi" in Kispest. The XIX these papers have been in debt ever since for unraveling the district's "fidish thread", but it seems that Péter Gajda did not care about the possible political - and corruption - risk.
The managing director of the company is an old friend of Csaba Lackner, who also appears on one or another audio recording. In one of them, for example, he talked about having a residence permit in the Seychelles. On one occasion, Lackner also said about Gábor Kormos, whom he only addressed as "Kormi": "What I do in my committee and the way I do it with Patek, Zsombor, Somogyi and Kormi is enough for me."
It seems that Gajda was not deterred by scandals and negative press coverage either, Apcoa received a total of seven orders, typically for road and sidewalk renovations. (In connection with such Kispest projects, Ákos Hadházy, an independent member of parliament, also filed a complaint in cases of suspected abuse). The company with a dubious reputation received a total of HUF 6.7 million in orders since the outbreak of the scandal in 2019...
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