According to the suspicion, part of the public money intended for the investment may have ended up in the form of cash, through several intermediaries, in the Budapest City Hall and in the pockets of leading left-wing politicians.
Lawyer Gyula Budai filed a complaint regarding the suspected corruption of the Lánchíd renovation, and the police have already ordered an investigation. After the election of Gergely Karácsony as mayor, the new leadership rejected the tender signed by the István Tarlós for the renovation of the Chain Bridge on favorable terms and a new public procurement was announced.
The winner of the tender was A-Híd Zrt., which also ran under the previous city administration, but they won with a bid five billion forints more expensive than what they would have paid for to complete the work under the previous city administration. Compared to István Tarlós, the advance due to the contractor was increased to almost sixty times, to HUF 4.2 billion, and the penalty charged to the company was halved.
Even then, Gergely Karácsony was told about the unjustified increase in prices, but the management only rebuffed it. According to the audio recording obtained by Mandiner, the old confidant of the former prime minister, Gordon Bajnai, said that the renovation became HUF 5 billion more expensive because money was redistributed from it.
The businessman literally put it like this: “they are busy with this Lánchíd and Blaha Lujza tér, and with looting and distribution around them, etc., etc.” Then, in response to the other party’s question as to whether money can be taken out of this, Bajnai’s former comrade-in-arms confirmed:
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“Well, it has become more expensive by five billion, and it has less content.”
According to this, the city administration could pump money out of the project.
This conversation took place in 2021, when the Lánchíd money went to the company of Mór Vig, a lawyer who has since been banned from practicing. In addition to being the brother of Amnesty leader Dávid Vig, the man was detained by NAV last November after falling into a multi-hundred million invoice factory.
In the case, the tax authorities conducted house searches at several locations and seized money, among other things they visited a certain lawyer Dániel Hegedüs and also A-Híd Zrt., which is carrying out the renovation of the Chain Bridge.
According to information that came to light a few weeks ago, between November 2020 and July 2022, A-Híd transferred HUF 1.4 billion to Vig’s company, of which HUF 900 million was transferred to the man’s private account and his lawyer’s escrow account. According to the suspicion, the transfers to the accounts linked to Vig Mór typically took place on the same days as the days on which the funds from A-Híd Zrt. arrived at the company, and the amounts were withdrawn in cash from the accounts within a short period of time.
Since Mór Vig was banned from practicing as a lawyer in January 2022, he transferred the remaining amount that came to the company to Dániel hegdüs’s own lawyer’s escrow account, and then withdrew about five hundred million forints in cash from there.
The above dates and data were also confirmed by the ordered Kehi investigation, the partial report of which revealed suspicious financial transactions between A-Híd Zrt., which carried out the renovation of Lánchíd, and Vig Mór’s company – thereby refuting Gergelyek Karácsony’s previous claim that between the renovation and the suspicious financial transactions there is no time coincidence.
After that, an unknown person sent a letter to the former government commissioner for accountability, Gyula Budai. According to the contents of the letter, Mór Vig went to the office of the security company located at the Mammut shopping center to account for the sums pumped out of the Lánchíd investment and then withdrawn in the form of cash. According to the letter writer, this took place between the head of the company and the lawyer.
It may follow from this that the one and a half billion forints transferred by A-Híd Zrt. to the former lawyer could have changed hands here, and according to Budai, the security company is connected with A-Híd Zrt., which is carrying out the renovation. In addition, the letter sender knows that significant sums of money from the bridge money went to the left wing in the capital.
Based on the available data, it could be concluded that the security company was located at Lövőház utca 7–9. Árgus-Security Vagyonvédelmi Kft., and one of the owners of the company is Endre Zoltán Apáthy, whose father Endre Apáthy’s family interests include A-Híd Zrt.
So, if the allegations are true, the saved money could have been returned to A-Híd Zrt, which carried out the Chain Bridge renovation, from where the sums ended up at the Budapest City Hall, according to the letter writer.
Gyula Budai filed a complaint with the police on suspicion of official bribery, and the National Investigation Agency (NNI) ordered an investigation.
Source: mandiner.hu
On the cover photo, Mayor Gergely Karácsony and Walter Katalin, CEO of BKK, at the opening of the renovated Lánchíd road on December 16, 2022. Source: MTI/Zoltán Balogh
Tags: Money Chain Bridge renovation distributed City Hall
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