Investigative journalist Marek Wollner introduces the podcast with the words: “For me, of course, it is an honor that we can welcome a guest who avoided the media for a long time and with whom I was actually connected somewhat paradoxically. And I would even say that the beginning of my downfall begins at his name. It’s Mr. Hlubuček.“
“I really haven’t seen much in that year and a half,” stated Petr Hlubuček and talked about the “demonization of his person” and the “circus” surrounding the entire Dosimeter case. “Now is the time when we can start unraveling those things bit by bit in some real world“, says Hlubuček.
According to him, it is not true that he knew about the investigation. “I had no idea what was going on.” claims Hlubuček today. He suspected, however, that he was “under the supervision of some elements”. “Yes, sometimes someone came to say that we were wanted by the police, that someone was following me. That’s what someone tells you over and over until you stop paying any attention to it,” he declared.
Hlubuček: Execution for the entire STAN
Hlubuček considers the charges against him defamatory. “I think that the way it was written, it was written as an execution not only for me, but also for the entire STAN,” says Hlubuček. At the same time, it is said that completely unnecessary details were mentioned in the accusation, while a number of events should have been described inaccurately according to Hlubuček.
According to Hlubuček, for example, descriptions of parties were strange. As an example, he gave the celebration of the birth of the child of former colleague Radovan Krejčíř Michala Redla. „His child was born and we saw each other, I went to congratulate him. At that moment, in that document, in that accusation, it was written that it was a party, or rather that it was a meeting of a group, an organized group, which arranged some business there. It just wasn’t like that at all” claims Hlubuček.
According to Hlubuček, certain parts of the file were strongly taken out of context. “To this day, the police have not allowed all the wiretaps they have to be part of the file. They just took some sentences out of it, some parts of the wiretapping and made a story out of it. Because if the interceptions were seen in their entirety, it would be clear that I am coming with a bottle of wine to congratulate Mr. Redl on the birth of a child,” he is convinced.
Was Redla introduced to him by the management of STAN?
It is said that Hlubuček did not know Redl, who lived in Zlín, until he became deputy mayor. “Look, I had never been to Zlín before I became deputy mayor. I didn’t know Mr. Redl until then. When I became deputy mayor, the then management of STAN brought in Mr. Redl and introduced him to me as a person who is an entrepreneur, a donor to STAN and helps STAN,” he recalled of their acquaintance.
What does the management of STAN mean? “The management of STAN at the time, which was there, actually spills over until today, but let’s say that somehow… these people worked there at that time. I didn’t see any problem in this, because I say all the time that if a politician is not connected with entrepreneurs, with hoteliers, with builders, with developers, then he does not know what is happening, he does not know what is happening in the country’s economy, he does not know what is happening happening in the city, in the state,” said Hlubuček.
Communication and lively contacts with businessmen therefore seemed to him desirable for understanding the country’s economy. “Who pays taxes, who runs this economy, is the business world, so you simply need to communicate with them. I had a personal conflict with Mr. Čižínský in this matter and with Mr. Hřibe, because I said that you just need to talk to entrepreneurs. I didn’t see anything wrong with simply talking to Mr. Redl either,” he said, adding that he didn’t even know from the beginning that Redl was Krejčír’s former colleague.
Hlubuček: Demonization of myself and Krejčír
Why did Hlubuček even hang out with Redl as a former colleague of Krejčír? “That’s a media acronym that I didn’t even know at the beginning, when Mr. Krejčíř was working here, I was much lessI worked in the private sector and I think that even the demonization of Mr. Krejčír is huge,” says Hlubuček.
“The demonization of my person is such that a wide range of people with whom I interacted suddenly deleted me from those social networks or perhaps just deleted photos with me from those social networks. It’s really comical and embarrassing,” said Hlubuček in the podcast.
Austrian: I have never seen Redl
In the next part of the podcast, Hlubuček pointed directly to the chairman of STAN. “Imagine that the chairman of the party you belong to comes, brings you someone and says: this is a person who helps us, either financially or in any way within the party. So of course you will naturally communicate with him. And it was also the STAN management that recommended people to city companies. If some kind of hierarchy works, even though within STAN we have a great deal of subsidiarity and independence within individual regions, cities and municipalities, you simply try to respect this in some way,” Hlubuček described establishing relations with former colleague Krejčíř in the podcast.
He was the deputy mayor for the environment, infrastructure, technical equipment and security Hlubuček was elected on November 15, 2018. Petr Gazdík was the chairman of STAN in the years 2016 – 2019, The 1st vice-chairman during this period is the current head of the movement Vít Rakušan.
It is the Austrian who denies that he would have brought Redl to see Hlubuček. “I never saw Mr. Redl, I don’t know him.” the Austrian himself responded for Blesk.
Gazdík communicated with Redl
However, former chairman Gazdík knew Redl. He derived personal responsibility from this, on June 29, 2022, he quit as Minister of Education.
“Michal Redl communicates quite normally via a mobile phone with cryptographic protection with the vice-chairman of the STAN movement Petr Gazdík,” Novinky.cz quoted from the police resolution.
“We know Michal Redl, I never denied that,Gazdík admitted in the past. “He told me his opinions – for example, about the media image of STAN. But I absolutely deny that Michal Redl interfered in any way in the decision-making of the STAN movement or in my political decisions,” stated Gazdík in 2022, who was the mayor of Suchá Lozi in the Zlín Region from 2002 to 2010 and from October 2008 to February 2022 a representative of the Zlín region, in which the businessman Redl also worked.
Blesk’s apology to Vito the Austrian
We hereby apologize to Mgr. I congratulate Rakušan, the current chairman of the STAN movement and Minister of the Interior of the Czech Republic, that with the publication of an article published on 20/03/2024 on the news website blesk.cz with the title “Shocking words of Hlubučka after a year and a half of silence: Redla was brought by an Austrian!” He allegedly helped with finances” we have unauthorizedly interfered with the personality of Mgr. He welcomes the Austrian. The information regarding his person, contained both in the headline and in the original text of the article, was not based on the truth.
Listen to the entire interview with Petr Hlubuček on the website of the Blind Justice podcast.
Grandma in Chambers: Organized crime STAN
At the same time, Andrej Babiš (ANO) launched into STAN in the House of Representatives on Wednesday because of the Dosimeter case during the extraordinary meeting “Safety events for the Czech Republic”, convened precisely because of him, his statements and attitudes.
“We keep repeating that STAN originated as an organized crime in the Zlín Region and gradually spread its tentacles all the way to Prague,” claims Babiš. “Rédla, that’s the one from Krejčíř, was supposed to be presented to Hlubuček by the chairman of the STAN movement, Vít Rakušan,” Babiš wondered.
“What is this? Hlubuček, sunk the Austrian, in my opinion, there should have been an extraordinary Dosimeter meeting,” Babiš means.
Marek Wollner also spoke about the relationship between Hlubuček and Redl in the podcast. “Mr. Redl was a very attractive figure for the media, because he was a former associate of Radovan Krejčíř, one of the most famous Czech mobsters, and I have to say that of course this connection could lead many naysayers to believe that something wrong was probably going on, if you had such a close relationship with Mr. Redle, I would even say that the political opposition, led by Mr. Babiš, was able to use this connection very skillfully against the entire STAN, when they call you that you are actually a party of the mafia,” pointed out Wollner.
How did Petr Hlubuček experience the Dosimeter case?
- “The truth is that I had a really successful business, I ran an arrivals travel agency, I had my own hostel, I rented an office building in the center of Prague, which I completely rebuilt into a three-star hotel. In 2009, I then left for a year, let’s say, on a trip around the world, and when I came back, my neighbor in Lysolaj said: let’s go, we have to save Lysolaj from some massive development (…) We succeeded, I was the leader at the time , I became mayor and was re-elected two more times after that. I was mayor in Lysolaj for a total of 12 years,” Hlubuček recalled in the podcast about his beginnings in municipal politics.
- He was the mayor of the Prague – Lysolaje district from November 2010 to June 20, 2022, a representative of this district from October 16, 2010 to September 24, 2022. He joined STAN in 2016.
- On June 15, 2022, with 10 other people, he was accused of corruption and participation in an organized group in connection with the management of the Transport Company of the Capital City of Prague (DPP).
- “Of course it was crazy, imagine a bunch of policemen bursting into your house at six in the morning, you’re accused of criminal conspiracy, they go through all your personal belongings, they search your whole house, it took 24 hours,” Hlubuček said.
- On the day of his arrest, his membership in the STAN movement was suspended, and he resigned from some of his functions.
- On June 20, 2022, dismissed from the post of mayor of the Prague-Lysolaje district.
- On August 30, 2022, he was released from the remand prison in Litoměřice after posting bail.
- Expelled from the STAN movement in March 2023.
