The plot thickens in the Gorilla affair that points to possible corruption and mutual back-scratching between politicians and financial group Penta, as more information now reinforces suspicions that Anna Bubenikova (SDKU), who was recalled as head of the National Property Fund (FNM) yesterday over the affair, was in cahoots with the financial group.
Basically, Bubenikova’s husband Roman Bubenik is active in the company Pressburg Properties, which owns half of Hotel Tatry in the High Tatras, with ties also to former member of the FNM executive board, Jozef Jurica and the bank of Penta financial group, which has a lien to the property in Tatranska Lomnica.
It was Jurica that was mentioned together with Bubenikova in the leaked secret service Gorilla reports, both of them being accused of taking commissions from Penta for ensuring certain privatisations went smoothly. The latest links to the lucrative property could therefore add weight to these accusations.
Another curious point is that Pressburg Properties absorbed the company Elementa, via which the commissions from Penta mentioned in the Gorilla reports were supposed to be laundered.
Jurica, who is currently vice-chairman of the Board of Directors at Bratislavska Teplarenska heating company, controls the company G2G, which owns the other half of the hotel. The financing of the company is unclear as it suddenly hiked up its share capital from the minimum EUR 6,666 to over EUR 504,000 a few months after being established. Jurica is also the signatory for the hotel along with Jozef Skalica, who bears Bubenikova’s maiden name. Bubenikova refused to answer SME daily on if they are related.
With Bubenikova’s husband overseeing Pressburg Properties and Elementa, and Jurica controlling the other half via G2G, suspicions of corrupt payouts start to take on a more feasible dimension. Neither Bubenikova nor Jurica would comment on the latest findings. Penta financial group comes into play via its bank Privatbank, which holds the lien to the hotel property. This could be put down to coincidence, of course.
Gorilla took three more victims today as Milan Krajniak (KDH – adviser to interior minister Daniel Lipsic), Igor Grošaft (SDKU – member of Supervisory Board of Slovak transmission system operator SEPS), and head of St. Michal’s hospital of the Ministry of Interior, Stanislav Janota (KDH), all voluntarily stood down from their posts today for merely being mentioned in the Gorilla reports for the sake of order, while claiming complete innocence.
The actual content of the Gorilla reports has not been confirmed as authentic yet, but the fact that the recordings were made was confirmed yesterday by Bratislava Regional Court, which issued the authorisation for the monitoring, and more and more facts are now coming to light that raise the likelihood that the reports contain the truth, but there is a difference between truth and proof.