Bratislava, March 15, 2022 - Contracts for the sale or lease of land in the Slovak Land Fund (SLF) were prepared inconsistently and unsystematically. While some were signed within two months from the application, others waited up to seven years, which indicates the possibility of corrupt behaviour. Several external law firms were paid out millions eur against the law. SLF had several shortcomings in the land register of state-owned land as well as a land of unidentified owners it manages. Neither the supreme supervising body, the Board of The Fund, nor the other control mechanisms performed their role sufficiently. These findings of the auditors of the Supreme Audit Office of the Slovak Republic will be presented to the Parliamentary Committee on Finance and Budget by the Vice-president of the Auditors, Ľubomír Andrassy. 

According to the SAO, it is important to continue with systematic land readjustments, where the SLF should play an active role. The results of the audit were sent by the auditing body to law enforcement authorities due to possible suspicion of committing several criminal offences, mainly due to dereliction of the duties in asset management.

The full text of the press release about this issue in Slovak language is available here. Use the Google icon in the top bar for automatic translation.