The head of the prosecution service in Klagenfurt is dead a year-and-a-half after stepping down from the job. Yet not his death, but rather the comments afterwards by the Carinthian governor is worthy of note. He described the dead man as "loyal". And that certainly is reason for amazement, even from a governor who is noted for not thinking very much before speaking, as his remarks over the Hypo-banking affair clearly show.
Is it not the job and indeed the responsibility of the prosecutor also to bring a governor before the justice system if necessary? But that would imply absolutely the opposite of "loyal". Are politicians so certain that they are safe from prosecution that they can talk in public about the loyalty of the prosecutors?
And we have cases where the prosecutors suddenly find reason to charge an opposition politician shortly before the vote and also coincidentally at the same time as he announced the first time that he was to be the lead candidate of a party on the political right. And the charges refer to something that was already seven years in the past.
And then you also have, again coincidentally shortly before a vote, the probably illegal extradition of another opposition politician over a laughable row over an inheritance, rather like the way British prosecutors in Northern Ireland suddenly decided to pull up an opposition politician over a 40-year-old murder and to keep him in jail four days shortly before a vote.
And at the same time despite all the evidence to the contrary there is no charges against Werner Faymann, and until now not even any indication that anything is going to change.
Of course this is not coincidence. In Carinthia they call it loyalty.
This English version of comment from the Tagebuch was translated by the British journalist Michael Leidig and his team at the Central European News agency. He can be contacted for corrections and improvements to the English here: editor@cen.at
