Criminal complaint against regional councillor Mario Cavigelli

In February 2015 the Grand Council of Grisons declared the special hunt initiative invalid.

During the parliamentary debate, however, important information was withheld from it. Cantonal councillor Mario Cavigelli (CVP) had failed to make public the fact that the Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN) in Bern had found that the initiative did NOT violate superordinate law.

The cantonal government thus concealed from the Grand Council the conclusion of the Federal Office for the Environment (FOEN) that the special hunt initiative – which was signed by 11,000 people – was valid.

The special hunt is a problem for the population of Grisons because it leads to unspeakable barbarity and cruelty to animals. In this regard a second, more honourable popular initiative by animal welfare advocates is even under way. This one too, however, is being sabotaged in unspeakable fashion by the same circles within Mario Cavigelli's department.

Cantonal councillor Mario Cavigelli had known since 5 January 2015, from a letter from the FOEN , that is before the initiative was dealt with by the Grand Council in the February 2015 session, that the initiative did not contravene federal law.

In an email from Mario Cavigelli (which is available to IG Wild beim Wild) to the FOEN dated 19 December 2014, for example, it reads:

«I assume that, after careful examination of the government's dispatch and the two corresponding expert opinions, the FOEN can align itself with the government's position. Otherwise an exchange of views between the FOEN and the Canton of Grisons must take place before the special hunt initiative is debated in the February 2015 session of the cantonal parliament. It must in particular be prevented that the FOEN and the canton communicate differing views on the validity of the special hunt initiative».

And this is precisely what cantonal councillor Mario Cavigelli, in a long-planned move, then did not do: namely to communicate truthfully.

«I should have submitted the letter to the Grand Council committee», Cavigelli apologised under pressure during the parliamentary question time in the December 2017 session, following an intervention by SVP Grand Councillor Jan Koch. Mario Cavigelli was facing an embarrassing parliamentary commission of inquiry (PUK).

In the Grand Council Cavigelli said:

“We simply know, from our point of view it is clear, the forest law and the federal hunting law cannot be reconciled with the initiative, and thus it is invalid”.

This, even though he had before him a letter from an official and higher authority stating the opposite. He not only deliberately misled the entire parliament.

Even the members of the preliminary advisory commission had been kept in ignorance of the federal letter; parliament ultimately declared the initiative invalid. The problem for Mario Cavigelli, however, was that the initiators did not give in and took the matter all the way to the Federal Supreme Court, where the initiative was finally declared valid and the serious misconduct of Mario Cavigelli came to light.

Had the BAFU decided in line with the wishes of cantonal councillor Mario Cavigelli and his office head, this BAFU report of 5 January 2015 would certainly have been immediately communicated in all the media as well, and would not simply have vanished into a drawer of Mario Cavigelli. But this is exactly what Mario Cavigelli had to do, because he did not want:

…the BAFU and the canton to communicate differing views on the validity of the special hunt initiative.

Mario Cavigelli himself, in order to clarify the question of whether the initiative was valid, consulted the higher authority (BAFU). To then conceal this and now, under pressure, play it down is unacceptable.

The conclusion of the Federal Office for the Environment (BAFU) was clear: the special hunt initiative does not obviously violate federal law. So it reads at the end of a four-page letter that the BAFU sent to the Grisons cantonal councillor Mario Cavigelli, around a month before the special hunt initiative was dealt with in the Grisons parliament. Only: no one knew of the letter's existence at the time, because Cavigelli kept it secret. In ignorance of this letter, the Grand Council declared the special hunt initiative invalid, whereupon the initiators appealed to the Federal Supreme Court.

Unlike in the private sphere, shady dealings within the state have a further dimension: trust in the state suffers. And this is fundamental to the functioning of state institutions and ultimately of democracy. A lack of trust accordingly endangers the body politic.

At the beginning of November 2017, the Federal Supreme Court also ruled 5:0 that the hobby hunters' first special hunt initiative is valid and must therefore go before the people. Cavigelli resisted this too, in his usual arrogant hobby hunter mentality, but to no avail. He subsequently described the federal judges in Lausanne in a television interview virtually as unqualified “bureaucrat's-office judges”.

In addition, two legal opinions have already pointed out that the special hunt initiative does not „obviously“ contradict federal law.

State Councillor Mario Cavigelli has caused the initiative committee, taxpayers and others a great deal of trouble, hassle and expense, and has wilfully deceived the entire population.

For this reason, IG Wild beim Wild has filed a criminal complaint with the responsible public prosecutor in Chur, on the grounds of, among other things, abuse of office and disloyal conduct in office.