April 27th, 2016
Magyar Idők accuses former Socialist Prime Minister Péter Medgyessy’s consultancy company of receiving 600 thousand Euros from Alstom. The French company sold a fleet of underground railway carriages to Budapest under the previous, left-liberal administration.
In an unsigned report on Tuesday, Magyar Idők writes that Alstom transferred a total of 600 thousand Euros in two instalments to Mr Medgyessy’s ’family company’ in 2007 and 2008. Alstom’s London branch is under investigation in Great Britain. Four senior managers are allegedly suspected by the Serious Fraud Office of involvement in the transfer of 2.3 million Euros ’to promote the sale’ of underground railway carriages to the city of Budapest in 2006 and 2007. (The sum amounts to roughly one per cent of the price Budapest paid for the carriages.) The deal was considered suspect by the Court of Auditors in 2011 and an investigation has been officially underway in Hungary ever since, without any progress reported. Mr Medgyessy acted as a consultant to French companies before and after his term as Prime Minister from 2002 to 2004. Magyar Idők does not elaborate on whether the sum transferred to Mr Medgyessy’s company was part of the 2.3 million alleged bribe money or who the remaining recipients were.
Tags: Budapest, corruption, Medgyessy
