Finance Minister, Ivan Milkos, held an extraordinary press conference this morning to explain a very unusual and absurd situation at the Supreme Court.
The finance minister had given the authorisation for an audit to be conducted at the Supreme Court starting 27 July and had informed the Supreme court about it accordingly on 21 July. The Supreme Court requested an extension to the start of the audit, giving holidays and lack of capacity at the court as the reason. The Finance Ministry accepted the request, postponing the start of the audit to yesterday afternoon at 3 pm.
When the auditors arrived, however, they were refused access, allegedly because the authorisation was not valid (quoting the reason that it should have been done 2 days earlier).
At the press conference, minister Miklos called the denial of access to the auditors as evident obstruction, as it was the Supreme Court itself that had requested the postponement and the authorisation explicitly says that the audit would take place “from 27th July, and not on that day” said Miklos. Miklos was obviously irritated, saying the Supreme Court was not dealing with its own money or that of its chairman Harabin, but with public money, and the Ministry of Finance had every right to audit the use of public money in all institutions.
Miklos referred to the situation as “totally absurd and without precedence” and he intends to take whatever steps are necessary to get justice from what should be the highest institution of justice in the country.
Exactly what reason Harabin and the Supreme Court would have to thwart the audit can only be speculated.