Simecka: Current Government Trying to Cover up Corruption by Attacking My Family

Bratislava, 10 February (TASR) - The current government is trying to cover up its incompetence and corruption by attacking my family, said opposition Progressive Slovakia (PS) party leader Michal Simecka during the parliamentary debate on the results of a government audit into the use of public subsidies on Tuesday. The audit revealed shortcomings, among others, in the Project Forum NGO, of which Simecka's mother is a statutory representative. Simecka didn't question its findings, but criticised a non-standard procedure, with accounting matters being addressed by Parliament and the government rather than the authorities designated for this purpose. "If this concerned any other citizen and their NGO, the issue wouldn't be discussed by Parliament, the premier wouldn't be holding news conferences, hateful videos wouldn't be produced, and there wouldn't be a witch hunt like the one that the coalition is conducting here. My mother's 'fault' is that she is the mother of the leader of a political party that will defeat Smer-SD in the next election," stated Simecka. Simecka pointed out that errors in drawing subsidies would normally be dealt by the authorities designated for that purpose, not by the government or Parliament. "In any other case, the state would act completely normally - the NGO would have to undergo audits, submit invoices and books, it might have to return some money or pay fines, and perhaps the police would get involved in that as well," he said, calling the government's behaviour bullying. Simecka also spoke about the purpose-built character of the audit. He noted that 61,000 entities received subsidies between 2020 and 2025, the period covered by the audit. "By complete coincidence, the government audit chose 26 of these entities for audits, and, as luck would have it, one of them was my mother's NGO," he said. Simecka didn't dispute the identified shortcomings concerning the NGO's accounting of a grant. He stated that his mother is ready to accept the consequences and is cooperating. At the same time, he stressed that neither PS nor he personally have ever been in a position to make decisions on subsidy allocation. ko/df