Ex-Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache is (again) accused of corruption. The cause revolves around Asfinag and the entrepreneur Siegfried Stieglitz. The “press” reports live.
Former FPÖ leader and Vice Chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache has to answer to the court again. Again it is about the allegation of bribery. Specifically, the Economic and Corruption Public Prosecutor’s Office (WKStA) accuses the 52-year-old, the (for bribery) accused entrepreneur Siegfried Stieglitz of donating to the FPÖ-affiliated association “Austria in Motion”, a supervisory board post at the Asfinag to have provided. If convicted, the penalty is six months to five years in prison. Both deny wrongdoing; It is the presumption of innocence.
According to the current status, six trial days are planned. For today and tomorrow the prosecution’s statement, the defense counsel’s replies (street is represented by Johann Pauer) as well as statements by the two accused. Should be on Friday Norbert Hofer be questioned – the Third President of the National Council was Infrastructure Minister for the FPÖ at the time of the alleged Postenschachers; further interrogations are planned for July 19th and 21st, and a verdict is expected on July 26th.
What is it about? In the course of investigations after the “Ibiza video” became known, chat messages were secured, written on the one hand by Strache himself and on the other hand by Stieglitz. All in all, they draw a picture for the WKStA, according to which Stieglitz intervened at Strache in 2017 (he became Vice Chancellor in December 2017) in order to obtain a supervisory board position in a state-related company. He also transferred the FPÖ-affiliated association “Austria in Motion” (which Strache is said to have told him about according to the interrogation protocol on the roof terrace of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Vienna) from October 2017 in four tranches of 2,500 euros each.
On March 2, 2018, Stieglitz took a seat on the supervisory board of the state-owned Autobahnen- und Schnellstrassen-Finanzierungs-Aktiengesellschaft, or Asfinag for short. In 2020, Stieglitz was recalled by the minister responsible, Leonore Gewessler (Greens). Before that, however, money from the Upper Austrian landed again in the account of the association structure around the Viennese lawyer and former FPÖ MP Markus Tschank: Between June and August 2018 five donations of 2000 euros each went there.
Aside from the money, the WKStA will also present an invitation to a trip in court: Stieglitz is said to have invited Strache (with whom he has known since a celebration in March 2011 and vacationed together in southern France in 2012) to Dubai in 2019 to be there with him and others Acquaintances (invitations are said to have also been sent to Hofer and the Asfinag directors Hartwig Hufnagl and Josef Fiala, who in turn canceled) to celebrate his 50th birthday. In the end, however, there was no joint party: after a few weeks, Strache referred to “compliance” problems and did not travel.
On the other hand, a non-final guilty verdict in August 2021 did happen: At that time he and the owner of the private clinic Währing, Walter Grubmüller, sentenced to conditional prison terms by judge Claudia Moravec-Loidolt for corruption and bribery. Strache took 15 months, Grubmüller twelve. Both defendants announced that they would “enter into full appeals”.
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