The former chief of staff of the Ministry of the Interior and the current office manager of Chancellor Karl Nehammer (ÖVP), Andreas Achatz, was invited to the subcommittee of the ÖVP on Wednesday. A repatriation project of an association led by ex-VP boss Michael Spindelegger came into the picture. Asylum seekers from Nigeria must be persuaded to voluntarily return to their home country. It appeared in the U-committee that only one asylum seeker traveled back. Nevertheless, the Ministry of the Interior supported the project with more than 270,000 euros.
The SPÖ faction leader in the U-Committee, Kai Jan Krainer, asked Achatz about the promotion of the International Center for Migration Policy Development (ICMPD), which leads ex-ÖVP boss Michael Spindelegger as general director.
33 Nigerians should have been repatriated
Specifically, it was a pilot project of the association, with the aim of educating about 30 people from Nigeria in Austria for life in their home country and then bringing them back home. According to Krainer, the project was funded with more than 270,000 euros by the Ministry of the Interior (BMI), but only one person participated. They did not even complete the training in Austria.
Department criticized funding level
As Walter Fleissner of the SPÖ Parliamentary Club wrote on Twitter, the association was originally pledged EUR 750.00 for the project. However, as reported by the “Kleine Zeitung”, the responsible specialized department wrote to the then Interior Minister Karl Nehammer in February 2021 to criticize a number of points in the association’s application. For example, there were ineligible cost items. In the end, the BMI “only” paid out about 270,000 euros.
As Krainer emphasized, the full grant amount was not recovered in relation to the association’s efforts. Incidentally, there has been no press release about the project on the association’s website since May 2021.
Achatz initially couldn’t remember anything on the committee, it wasn’t until Krainer handed him a letter in which Achatz talked about completely missing targets that he remembered. Despite this, the funding was maintained, Krainer criticized.
As Fleißner wrote on Twitter, in addition to writing from the specialist department, there was also correspondence between Achatz, Nehammer and Spindelegger. Achatz could remember his letter to Spindelegger in the U-Commission, but the letter was only “handed” to him for signature. Achatz could say nothing about Spindelegger’s letter to Nehammer.
Source: Krone
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