The Conservative Party’s mayor in Stavanger, Sissel Knutsen Hegdal, has resigned after using party funds for her own personal use. The party has turned the case over to the police and Hegdal has done what many Norwegian officials do when they get into trouble: Gone out on sick leave.
Hegdal’s use of a party credit card occurred during the election campaign last year, and amounted to at least nine cases of using Conservative Party funds for concert tickets, dinners, airline tickets and online shopping. She has since paid back all the money, which amounted to NOK 51,148 (around USD 5,000), but opted to leave her post. “I see that I made a mistake,” she told newspaper Stavanger Aftenblad during a lengthy interview at her home on Wednesday. Then she went on sick leave, avoiding questions from other media.
Party officials aren’t filing police charges against her but decided to turn the matter over to police for any further investigation. “Regardless of whether the police chooses to investigate further, we strongly believe that was the only right thing for a political party to do in a case that in our view is very serious,” stated party secretary Tom Erlend Skaug in a press release.
Conservatives leader Erna Solberg, who’s been in trouble herself over her husband’s unreported stock trading, called the case “very sad and very serious.” She nonetheless thanked Hegdal for her “political contribution” and hopes the party’s local chapter in Stavanger will now find a new candidate to take over as mayor, an important post that the party won back from Labour last year. “Stavanger is a fantastic city that needs a continuation of good Conservative politics,” Solberg said.
NewsinEnglish.no staff