Pest county socialists are organizing a demonstration in front of the BRFK building and in front of the Vác town hall, Magyar Hírlap has learned. Their protest is based on the fact that the police have been investigating the fictitious account scandal that broke out in the MSZP for more than three years, but there are still no suspects in the process. At the same time, as the head of the Pest County office issuing receipts for the fictitious accounts, the socialist deputy mayor of Vác is currently the number one person responsible for the management of public funds. In August 2019, János Both, former mayor of Vác and former MP of the MSZP filed a complaint due to the outrageous inaction of the party leadership regarding the invoice factory. Magyar Hírlap asked him for an interview on the matter.

- Although we have dealt with the MSZP invoice factory several times in our newspaper, it does not hurt to recall exactly what happened. Could you summarize the essence of the case?  

- In the past, basic organizations in the MSZP actually received provisions for their operation. This tradition still existed during the time of Attila Mesterházy, between 2010-14, but in Pest County, as of 2012, this practice was only continued in a fictitious manner. The case came to light when, in 2016, when moving out of the party headquarters on Jókai Street, the hóruk workers asked to empty the safe, and that's when the blocks of accounts fell out. This is how several of the party members and leaders who helped with the move found out that the grassroots organizations had received money. Later, however, it turned out that none of the fifty-two presidents of basic organizations in Pest County received any supplies, and their signatures were forged on the invoices issued in their names. For example, I, as the president of the basic organization in Vác, took a total of several hundred thousand forints on paper three times from the head of the Pest County office, Zsolt Kiss, and from the president of the Pest County, Tóbiás József, as voucher issuers. In reality, however, we never saw a single orphaned penny of this money.

– How is it possible that all of this was already known in 2016, but a complaint was filed only in 2019?

– The royal plural is a strong expression, since I filed the report myself, in my own name. In 2016, the Ethics Committee in Pest County investigated the events and ruled that this was a criminal case, and further investigation was not their responsibility. And the national financial committee approved this, except that in 2018 there was a change of president, Gyula Molnár was replaced by Bertalan Tóth, who did not take the case further. The presidents of Pest County, István Trenka, and then Zoltán Fekete, who followed him, refused to sign the balance sheet either, they did not take responsibility for the "management" of their predecessors. I was also shocked by how the State Audit Office was able to accept the MSZP's balance sheet without the authentication of the county presidents.

- Didn't the disciplinary committee of the MSZP even investigate?

– It is almost symbolic that the man who was later arrested for smuggling cigarettes at the Ukrainian border should have been investigated at the head of the disciplinary committee. After the party leadership failed to reveal the obvious crime and report it, in 2019 I myself decided to turn to the prosecutor's office. When Magyar Hírlap wrote this, it added fuel to the fire. Shortly after that, documents landed in the mailbox of my apartment, and three kilos of material were placed in a bag in front of my garage, which I then handed over to the police. These forged documents covered the period from 2012 to 2015, i.e. four years.

The full article of Magyar Hírlap can be read here.

Author: Károly Bán

Picture: Tamás Purger