Her prosecutorial authorities Czech Republic announced today that the police asked the prosecutor to prosecute the prime minister Andrei Babis, after submitting to her the file concerning an alleged fraud with European subsidies.
Police believe Babis temporarily removed the “Stork Nest” farm near Prague from the huge agroforestry group Agrofert in 2007 to take advantage of subsidies for small and medium-sized enterprises.
The 66-year-old businessman-politician is the fifth richest man in the Czech Republic, according to Forbes magazine. He denies any wrongdoing.
“Evidence of what the media call the ‘stork nest case’ was submitted to the attorney general today, along with a police proposal to prosecute,” the Prague prosecutor’s office said in a statement. “The prosecutor will now study the documents to decide whether to prosecute, end the criminal proceedings or pursue a different handling of the case,” he added.
The police had requested in 2019 to prosecute the prime minister, but a prosecutor ruled the allegations unfounded and acquitted him. That same year, however, the attorney general reopened the case against Babis and his aide, Yana Magierova.
Babis is also accused by the European Commission of a conflict of interest.
The Prime Minister insists that he transferred Agrofert to two trusts in order to avoid any conflict of interest, however, he still appears in the public registers as the usufructuary of the group.
Babis heads a minority government that emerged from the cooperation of his centrist, populist party, the ANO (“Yes”), with the Social Democrats. For years, the ANO accounted for more than 30% of opinion polls, but recently voters have been dissatisfied, mainly due to the government’s management of the pandemic. About four months before the October parliamentary elections, the ANO is in third place with 19%, according to a poll released last weekend. Two opposition coalitions have higher percentages.
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