Corruption cops look at United List politicians posing on combine harvester

KNAB will also assess whether administrative resources were used in the campaigning. The Prime Minister’s schedule, previously distributed to the media by the State Chancellery, states that Kulbergs went on a regional visit to Kurzeme last Friday. Meanwhile, United List's (AS) social media on Saturday stated that over the weekend, the AS Kurzeme team travelled through South Kurzeme and Liepāja. The journey took them through Durbe, Grobiņa, Liepāja and Nīca – to meet businesspeople and farmers, local authorities and, “most importantly, the people.” Accompanying the Kurzeme team on the visit were AS representatives – Prime Minister Kulbergs, Finance Minister Māris Kučinskis, for whom this visit was part of his ministerial duties, Minister for Justice Edvards Smiltēns, the leader of the Latgale list Juris Viļums, Chair of the Saeima Defence Committee Raimonds Bergmanis, and AS board member Jānis Vilnītis. In Durbe, representatives of AS visited the ‘Pīlādži’ farm run by Edgars Putra, Member of the Saeima and Parliamentary Secretary at the Ministry of Finance, whilst in Grobiņa they toured the metalworking company “RK Metal” and discussed current local issues with the leadership of the South Kurzeme local authority. In Liepāja, the focus was on the city’s development, business, manufacturing and new opportunities for the entire region. They also visited the Liepāja Industrial Park and Liepāja City Council, as well as the Latvian rally exhibition “Garage 1965” and the company “Liepājas papīrs”. To round off the day, the AS representatives visited SIA “Nīcas siers” and a farm. Attached to this press release are photos showing AS representatives posing on a combine harvester and AS buses bearing images of politicians parked in a harvested grain field. In a LETA news agency podcast entitled “What even was that?”, Kulbergs admitted on Monday that colleagues had invited him to take part in pre-election activities, but that he did not have time to campaign. Kulbergs also does not believe that he is using his position as Prime Minister as part of a pre-election campaign. He emphasised that Friday’s visit to Kurzeme was a regional visit, during which, amongst other things, the politician met with voters in Nīca and Liepāja. Regarding a photograph posted on the AS’s social media that day, showing several of the party’s candidates standing on a combine harvester, Kulbergs, however, is said to have posed as AS’s prime ministerial candidate. He said that on that day he had driven past Grobiņa on his way back from a visit to Zemgale and had made good use of his time. The KNAB also confirmed that, in total, from the start of the pre-election campaign period until 10 August, it had received 30 reports of possible breaches of the Pre-election Campaign Law. Of these, three reports relate to the possible use of administrative resources in pre-election campaigning. KNAB is currently continuing to assess the information received.