The municipality’s lawyers are dealing with a submission to the councilor’s advisor regarding the disclosure of information

The lawyers of the Prague municipality are dealing with a complaint against the adviser of councilor Adam Zábranský (Pirates) Petr Beneš due to the alleged disclosure of information to the opposing party in a court case. It is not clear when the lawyers will make a decision. The municipality will not comment on the case until their decision, spokeswoman Vít Hofman told ČTK.

The Neovlivni.cz server reported that Jan Rak, director of the municipality’s property department, sent a letter to the director of the municipality in which he claims that Beneš brought out secret information from negotiations on Prague’s strategy in a lawsuit with Vinci Construction.

Beneš denies any guilt and, on the contrary, is considering filing a criminal complaint for defamation. Beneš’s resignation is demanded by the opposition ANO, whose representative Radmila Kleslová represents the company against Prague.

“Yes, we know about this case. In this matter, a submission was sent to the director of the municipality (Martin Kubelka) about this meeting, which he forwarded, as in other similar cases, to the legal support department of the Prague municipality, which will assess the situation. We will not comment on the case until the case is assessed by the legal support department,” said Hofman.

Beneš himself denies any guilt. “I have not disclosed any secret information to anyone and I am not considering resigning. I try to do the best possible job for Prague every day. But what I’m really considering at this point is filing a defamation suit. It looks like a targeted attack that is trying to discredit me,” Beneš told ČTK.

He stated that he does not know exactly what is written in the letter – just like Councilor Zábranský, who asked the officials for it. “At the moment, the office refuses to provide it to me with the argument that the director of the department (Rak) has identified himself as a whistleblower, and therefore they will investigate this matter in such a way as to prevent information leakage. I consider it absurd, the content of the letter is already being spread by the media, where the good name of the Pirates, myself and my advisor is being defamed, but we still do not know what the accusation is specifically,” said Zábranský.

Opposition representative and chairman of the municipal property management committee Martin Benkovič (ANO) sent a letter to Mayor Bohuslav Svobod (ODS) on Friday, asking him to resolve the situation and also to remove Beneš from the committee that Benkovič heads. Only city councilors can recall Beneš.

The dispute between Prague and the Vinci company concerns the municipal building, which stands on the company’s land in Prague 8. The company wants to pay rent to the city. In the first instance, the city lost the court case and subsequently appealed mainly because of the amount of the rent.

According to the server, Beneš then disclosed the city’s tactics to the company. Zábranský described the case as absurd. “Of course, the opposing party knows how Prague argues in the court case, because it essentially has access to all the documents that Prague sends to the court. I don’t understand what information my assistant was supposed to reveal,” he added.