[ad_1]
The article is continuously updated
Martin Pucher’s poll began at 10:26 am on Tuesday. After a long tug of war, the central figure in the commercial banking scandal with a loss of 870 million euros was effectively presented before the investigative commission of the state parliament. The 64-year-old former bank director and SV Mattersburg chairman, who had been seriously injured after two strokes, was accompanied by his wife Elisabeth, who had already testified in committee (“the bank was taboo at home”) and attorney Norbert Wess.
On the urgent recommendation of medical expert Manfred Walzl, Pucher was only allowed to be interviewed for about 45 minutes, and two doctors were also present.
Judge Walter Pilgermair wanted to know at first why the country had taken over the audit of the Commerzialbank homeowners cooperative in the mid-1990s. Pucher left Raiffeisen back then (Raiffeisen says they wanted to get rid of him) and needed a new auditor. The then red-black state government under SPÖ-LH Karl Stix took over the review.
Shaken repeatedly by crying spells and relieved by his wife, Pucher replied, “You can’t ask Stix anymore, he’s dead,” Pucher said. Stix wanted to speak to his then ÖVP Vice President Gerhard Jellasitz, and then the positive decision came. “I can’t tell you more,” Pucher said.
Gold plaques for Niessl, chaplain and mayor
He also claimed that both former LH Hans Niessl (SPÖ) “on his 50th and 60th birthday and when he left the government” and the SPÖ mayor of Mattersburg, Ingrid Salamon, had received “gold platelets” for a historic birthday. (The SPÖ regional councilor Christian Illedits had to resign in the summer of 2020).
Other mayors and former ÖVP economic adviser and football president Karl Kaplan also received these gifts.
“All the gifts they sent me as governor on my birthday were 1: 1 to a social fund,” Niessl denied minutes later.
When asked why the auditors of the FMA and the National Bank had not discovered the embezzlements at the bank for years, Pucher said: “I think he would have discovered them if he had been an auditor,” based on the counterfeit loans. For his part, however, there were never any donations to the bank auditors and “I did not eat with them either”, they were all “correct” people.
Where have the bank’s many millions gone? “I myself would be curious to know where certain parts of the sum I have heard went,” says his amazing information. “We falsify the bank balances” and there are false credits on the books. “I want to take responsibility for everything for which I am responsible. But not because of what I haven’t done at all. ” Pucher also stated: “Today I am the Watschenmann. But I wasn’t everything. “
Pucher gave compelling reasons for the fact that he submitted a voluntary report on July 14, 2020 in the middle of an examination by the National Bank: “I have never had it difficult.”
Apart from information already known to the supervisory board, no other person was informed before the bank closed, Pucher said.
Pucher also stated that when he was 18 years old he signed an application for membership with the ÖVP, but was never actively involved in politics. After “10 or 20 years” he announced his departure in writing.
“I’ve never gotten rich, I’m so sorry,” Pucher read in a personal statement at the end. He said goodbye with a “thank you” of relief.
