Chancellor Vratislav Mynář insists that he assesses what information the Castle will give to the public. For seven months, the law applies, according to which the appellate body is the Office for Personal Data Protection instead. Nevertheless, the Castle stood up to the paragraphs and refuses to issue minutes of meetings between Miloš Zeman and former Senate President Jaroslav Kubera. Kuber’s family says that pressure from the Castle contributed to his death.
When, in the past, citizens asked, for example, how much money Chancellor Vratislav Mynář takes, his subordinate castle officials refused to answer him. Although applicants for information could appeal, it was paradoxically, according to the law, that Mynar was the one who assessed the correctness of the decisions of his subordinates. But that has been a thing of the past since the beginning of this year.
The castle has its own legal department and, according to a previous finding of Aktuálně.cz, it still pays millions of crowns for external lawyers. Nevertheless, Mynář did not comply with the paragraphs that have been in force for the seventh month. They state that the Chancellor no longer decides on the information provided by the Castle to applicants. The legislators changed the legislation precisely because in some cases the appellate body against the decisions of their subordinates were officials who may have been interested in secrecy.
The correctness of the procedure of castle officials according to the law is now to be assessed by the Office for Personal Data Protection (ÚOOÚ), which has thus acquired new authority. According to his latest decision, which is available to Aktuálně.cz, Mynář has appropriated powers that he does not have at all according to the law.
This happened when, in the appellate stage, Mynář refused to issue minutes of meetings between President Miloš Zeman and the later Senate leader Jaroslav Kubera to political scientist Kateřina Kňapová, who requested them by law.
Entries are important. They could clarify the circumstances of the creation of a threatening letter from the Chinese embassy, which was published by Aktuálně.cz in February. Kuber’s family believesthat pressure from the Chinese embassy and the Castle not to travel to Taiwan as the second highest constitutional official contributed to Kuber’s unexpected death from a heart attack.
Representatives of communist China sent the letter to the Castle. However, he was found in Kuber’s case, along with a supporting note from the presidential office. It is not yet clear whether Zeman handed over the documents to him and why. At the request of the minutes of the meetings, the Castle first replied through the director of the legal department, Václav Pelikán, that they did not exist. After warning that the Chancellor himself defended them, Mynář stated that they were, but only for internal use. And he refused to release them, breaking the law.
It is not clear on the basis of which law Mynář decides
“The Office is of the opinion that the legal opinion expressed in the opinion of the obligated subject, which was sent to it, is not in accordance with valid legal regulations,” said Markéta Pokorná, head of the decision-making department of ÚOOÚ, in the resolution available to Aktuálně.cz.
At the same time, she added that it is not clear on the basis of which law Mynář decided on the appeal. He will now decide again whether he is obliged to issue registrations. The castle can protest against this.
The President’s Office defended itself before the ÚOOÚ by a decision of the Municipal Court in Prague in 2018, which ordered the Castle to issue Mynář’s payslips. According to its interpretation, however, it also follows from the judgment that the law conferring competence on the Office does not apply to it. However, the office itself does not agree with this. Aktuálně.cz also addressed Chancellor Mynář with a request for comment, he has not yet responded.
The final decision can still take a long time
It may be a precedent decision that could complicate the Castle’s attempts to conceal information in the future. In the past, people could only defend themselves in court in the rejection of Mynár, but this is an expensive and complicated way for applicants for information to access data that the president’s chancellor refuses to disclose. The ÚOOÚ, on the other hand, has the power to issue a so-called information order.
“The information order allows the Office for Personal Data Protection or a superior state administration body to directly order the provision of information. Failure to do so may lead to execution,” explained Petr Bouda from the international team of lawyers Frank Bold.
However, the author of the Act on Free Access to Information, Oldřich Kužílek, warns that it may take a considerable time before the Castle and the ÚOOÚ finally reach the right person. “The administrative law requires both authorities to clarify their powers. The whole matter can go to court,” Kužílek warned. Until then, according to him, the ÚOOÚ cannot order the Castle to release information.
He himself had previously described the Castle’s approach in this case as erroneous and obstructive. “The castle does not know the valid wording of the law, according to which it is no longer a superior body and has to submit the appeal to the Office for Personal Data Protection,” said Kužílek, to whom Aktuálně.cz submitted the legal arguments of the Castle for analysis.
The castle still informs the applicant for information on its website that the appeal body for the decision of the President’s Office is Chancellor Mynář. And he did not publish Kňapová’s records.
In his statement, Chancellor Vratislav Mynář argued with them, when he fundamentally refused that Zeman would put pressure on Kuber about his foreign trip. “I have always been present at meetings between Mr Kuber and the President, except for one. Of course, there are minutes of the meetings, which show what was discussed or what documents were passed on. And it is clear from them that there are no threats to or extortion has not taken place on them, ” protested with the Chancellor in a statement on the website of the Castle.
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