U-Committee: Financial auditor on special audience for Benko
The large company audit has been an independent authority since 2021. Around 3,000 tests are managed there, the “profit” is between 500 million and one billion euros, after appropriate testing, said the respondent during the initial interview by procedural attorney Christa Edwards. He was personally involved in the Palais Liechtenstein case, and there was no influence from the Secretary General in the Ministry of Finance Thomas Schmid or Finance Minister Hans-Jörg Schelling (ÖVP).
However, he did get in touch with “Austria’s best entrepreneur” through Schmid – this is how Schmid introduced the informant to Benko. On that day there was a call from the ministry that he should come to the ministry immediately, because then he was not yet a department head and deputy head of the tax office for large companies, the informant said. He then met Benko in Schmid’s antechamber, and Benko complained to him about his years of tax auditing. Schmid withdrew immediately, specifically he was never interested.
Long-term testing of Benkos Signa
The source admitted that the review of Benko’s signa had taken a long time. At the meeting in April 2018, Benko then stated that he wanted the case to be settled – that was also his own intention and the order of his board of directors, according to the official , because the case was about to expire.
The fact that the tax case took so long was due to a change of auditor, the complexity of the company structure and the incomplete information provided by the company. An appointment with Schmid, whom he met four times – twice at dinner, including with the later short-term finance minister and now FMA board member Eduard Müller – could not be refused either, because Schmid would have been his superior, so to speak.
Any entrepreneur can come
In principle, every entrepreneur can come to him and pour out his heart, that was part of his job. Then there is coffee and something sweet, but that has nothing to do with how the decision is made in the end. “We are tax auditors and not necessarily the darlings of the nation,” and one is not paid for the favor, but for the legal assessment. The meeting with Benko was rather unusual. The matter was about ten million euros.
The officials would also act more in the background, which is why the request for non-media publicity was due, because after all sensitive data was at stake. When she was appointed as a board member, the person providing information inherited four cases that have now been widely debated: the tax case Wolf, Illwerke, Palais Liechtenstein and Benko.
Much need for discussion with Vorarlberg
According to the source, there may have been a lot of discussion with those affected about the Vorarlberg energy company Illwerke – especially with the state of Vorarlberg and the responsible governor Markus Wallner – but here the responsible section head Gunter Mayr finally made the decision.
Questions about the examination of the Wirtschaftsbund were not allowed – this became active with the self-disclosure in March 2022 and is therefore outside the investigation period. According to the board member, there has not been any political influence on him so far – unlike a colleague from the large company audit, who was illegally prosecuted directly by the Ministry of Finance, especially by the British section head Müller.