Former Czech Prime Minister denies involvement in Nordic Wolds debt

According to a report published yesterday on ceskenoviny.cz, a Czech news website, former Czech prime minister Mirek Topolanek, is denying any wrongdoing by his government that led to the financial losses brought on by the 2009 FIS Nordic World Ski Championship held in Liberec this February. The event, which brought together the world’s best cross country skiers, ski jumpers and nordic combined skiers, racked up a reported 5.3 million-dollar debt.

In a written statement to the media Topolanek deflected blame by explaining “the first decision to hold the championship was made by the Social Democrat (CSSD) government of Vladimir Spidla in 2005.”

Topolanek and his administration took over planning the event during his first year in office in 2007.  The first indications of financial trouble came in late 2008, when organizers reported a “fatal lack of private sources and demanded aid from the state budget,” at which point the government contributed ten million dollars. According to Topolanek, the state budget eventually spent just under 14 million dollars on the championships.  

Original plans called for a 64 million-dollar investment in area facilities, but only about 30.5 million dollars were earmarked for the project. 

“We were dealing with the fundamental dilemma, whether to waste the spent or contracted financial means in the order of hundreds of millions of crowns, to return the already paid out 60 million crowns (3.2 million USD) from the International Ski Federation (FIS), allow for international shame and damage to the good name of the country among the international sport public, or to go ahead with the championship at the cost of further financial means,” Topolanek writes. “If a loss was really inflicted, responsibility for this rests exclusively and entirely unequivocally with the championship organizing committee.”

CSSD shadow education and sports minister Jiri Havel said in March that it was Topolanek’s government that increased the budget by more than one billion crowns. “The sole thing that the previous government decided was that it (the championship) will be held and that the budget be somewhere above half a billion crowns,” said Havel.

According to the report the event cost Czech taxpayers more than two billion crowns (107 million USD). The country’s Supreme Audit Office (NKU) has said tens of millions of crowns were wasted in the event preparation.

“The NKU has filed a criminal complaint against an unknown perpetrator over the procedure of the town of Liberec and the Liberec-based Technical University in preparations of the championship,” read the report.

According to a report published yesterday on ceskenoviny.cz, a Czech news website, former Czech prime minister Mirek Topolanek, is denying any wrongdoing by his government that led to the financial losses brought on by the 2009 FIS Nordic World Ski Championship held in Liberec this February. The event, which brought together the world’s best cross country skiers, ski jumpers and nordic combined skiers, racked up a reported 5.3 million-dollar debt.

In a written statement to the media Topolanek deflected blame by explaining “the first decision to hold the championship was made by the Social Democrat (CSSD) government of Vladimir Spidla in 2005.”

Topolanek and his administration took over planning the event during his first year in office in 2007.  The first indications of financial trouble came in late 2008, when organizers reported a “fatal lack of private sources and demanded aid from the state budget,” at which point the government contributed ten million dollars. According to Topolanek, the state budget eventually spent just under 14 million dollars on the championships.  

Original plans called for a 64 million-dollar investment in area facilities, but only about 30.5 million dollars were earmarked for the project. 

“We were dealing with the fundamental dilemma, whether to waste the spent or contracted financial means in the order of hundreds of millions of crowns, to return the already paid out 60 million crowns (3.2 million USD) from the International Ski Federation (FIS), allow for international shame and damage to the good name of the country among the international sport public, or to go ahead with the championship at the cost of further financial means,” Topolanek writes. “If a loss was really inflicted, responsibility for this rests exclusively and entirely unequivocally with the championship organizing committee.”

CSSD shadow education and sports minister Jiri Havel said in March that it was Topolanek’s government that increased the budget by more than one billion crowns. “The sole thing that the previous government decided was that it (the championship) will be held and that the budget be somewhere above half a billion crowns,” said Havel.

According to the report the event cost Czech taxpayers more than two billion crowns (107 million USD). The country’s Supreme Audit Office (NKU) has said tens of millions of crowns were wasted in the event preparation.

“The NKU has filed a criminal complaint against an unknown perpetrator over the procedure of the town of Liberec and the Liberec-based Technical University in preparations of the championship,” read the report.