Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák found himself in difficulties regarding a tax fraud scandal again on Friday - just 3 days after facing an unsuccessful no-confidence vote in the parliament. Filip Rybanič, a bank employee and an assistant to an MP for the liberal opposition party Freedom and Solidarity accessed the bank accounts of Robert Kaliňák, as well as Ján Počiatek, ex-finance and ex-transport minister. The SITA press agency has said that Filip Rybanič's findings point to both Kaliňák and Počiatek receiving payments from companies linked to tycoon Ladislav Bašternák, who was also in the center of last week's no-confidence vote against Kaliňák. The National Criminal Agency detained Rybanič on Friday and started the investigation.
After being confronted with Filip Rybanič's findings, Robert Kaliňák called his actions "an obvious criminal act" and refused to explain the transfers. Pavel Nechala, a lawyer cooperating with Transparency International, however points to similar cases abroad. "When breaching bank privacy was the only way to discover a crime, the whistleblowers would get sentenced, yet also receive a huge reward," Nechala explained to the SME daily.
