The Prosecutor's Office for Economic Affairs and Corruption (PIVK) has asked the parliament to remove the immunity of the leader of the Austrian Freedom Party (APF) and chairman of the parliamentary group Herbert Kickle. The request is based on allegations of giving false testimony in an investigative parliamentary commission, the Austrian magazine “Profil” reported yesterday, quoted by BTA.
The Cabinet of the President of the National Council Walter Rosenkrantz (APS) confirmed the request to lift the immunity yesterday afternoon in response to an inquiry by the Austrian news agency APA.
According to the indictment, Kickle told several falsehoods when he appeared before an investigative committee on April 11, including about the affair surrounding an advertising agency in Klagenfurt, as well as APS advertising deals and his relationship as Minister of the Interior with former APS MP Hans - Jörg Jenewein.
On August 26, the prosecutor's office in Vienna handed over the case to the PIVK, which now wants to investigate it. The PIVK did not want to make a comment about the APA agency, electronic media reported.
„The summoning of Herbert Kickle to the commission of inquiry was a political maneuver aimed at damaging Herbert Kickle personally and the APS as a whole,” the APS parliamentary club said in a written statement: “Therefore, from our point of view, the political a connection is obvious“.