Hungarian Member of Parliament Arrested In Bribe Scandal

A member of parliament from Hungary's ruling conservative-led coalition has been arrested after allegedly being caught red-handed receiving a bribe, the chief prosecutor's office said Friday. Zoltan Szekely of the Independent Smallholders' Party denied the charges, alleging he was set up.Szekely was detained by police after receiving HUF 20 million (EUR 75,000,USD 65,600) in an attache case from a businessman in a Budapest hotel, reports said. Chief Prosecutor Peter Polt has asked parliament to lift his immunity on suspicion of graft, a "precondition to starting a criminal procedure," Polt said in a statement. Szekely, the head of a parliamentary commission controlling public acquisitions,denied the graft charges on public television Friday. He said the businessman had promised him documents on a controversial public acquisition but the attaché case he handed over contained money instead of documents. "It was a setup," said 48-year-old Szekely, who was a football trainer before going into politics. The Smallholders, junior partner in Prime Minister Viktor Orban's ruling coalition,summoned their parliamentary group for Friday to decide over the expulsion of Szekely from the faction.