What’s going on in Hungary?
If you are up to date with European politics, you have probably heard the issues around mass migration. You are also probably familiar with the fact that Hungary is right in the eye of the storm, being practically the only country that actively denied entry to refugees/immigrants.
You might have also heard that Hungary has come under scrutiny by the EU, after a long term research found that the Hungarian legal system does not adhere to the EU’s standards of democracy. I don’t wish to go through the exact points of the report (look up the Sargentini report for more information), but suffice to say this will most likely lead to Hungary being denied the right to vote in the EU parliament, as well as possibly being denied EU funds in the future.
Our PM, Viktor Orban, responded by seeking support at right wing EU parliament representatives, and in the end, heavily polarising the parliament.
Now, this is only the cherry on top – Hungary, along with out ally, Poland, has been elected the last bastions of European sovereignity, and out PM has been hailed as a hero - by right wing news sources, of course.
Examples:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E0-UVORAs8s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3c28xbk41kI
But while Hungary has practically become a disembodied image for both the left and the right – for the left, it stands for everything tainted and bad, and for the right, it represents the political golden path -, I think it would be interesting to give you, G@Gers, an insight into what Hungarian politics is like from the INSIDE.
My views
Let me start off by making it clear. Politically I am a right leaning centrist. I support heavy regulations on economic migration, and I actually agree with a lot of the Hungarian government’s decisions regarding external politics and the migrant crisis. That being said...
Viktor Orban
Hungarian politics right now is inseparable from Orban. He’s been integral part of Hungarian politics ever since the Iron Curtain fell in 1989, and his reight has defined politics for the last decade. So it’s just fair that I show you the issue through his career.
The Beginning - Pan-European Picnic and Riots in 2006
He started out as a promising politician in his youth – a promise never fulfilled, sadly.
As a young politician, he represented dynamism and flexibility after the fall of the Worker's Party. However, his legislations and his rule in the beginning of his career were less then sadisfactory - he wasn't successful in solidifying his power during the 1990s.
Unbeknowns to the public, Orban is suspected to suffer from mild schizophrenia - he medicates himself in Wien after a failed election.
Rise to ultimate power
His ultimate reign starts in 2006, when he and his party members organised a violent riot from football hooligans to disrupt the power of the then-PM Ferenc Gyurcsany. Their efforts were successful – Gyurcsany’s position weakened, and in the middle of his second term, in 2009, he stepped down. In 2010, Orban won the elections with an Earth shattering victory, collecting more than 2/3 of the votes from the riled up masses who have been conditioned agains the previous government. Gyurcsany became the victim of character assassination, and served as the scapegoat for Orban for years to come.
The Orban Era and Its Attrocities
He changed members of the constitutional court to people on his side, and lenghtened their mandates to 9 years, so that if he loses the next election, opposing parties will be unable to change the consitution back (the court has to approve the changes).
He redrew voting districts to maximize his own success in the upcoming elections. This is called gerrymandering by the way.
The Hungarian laws state that with a 67% majority, the constitution can be overwritten. Orban used his opportunity. He completely reworked the constitution to fit his needs. At some point people stopped counting the changes.
He made it mandatory for members of a party to vote the same as the party leader – essentially ensuring that his power couldn’t be co-opted by disagreement inside the party.
He took private retirement funds into public property. As far as I remember, that was 2000 billion HUF (roughly 7.21 billion USD) that completely disappeared from the pockets of citizens. This is generally called theft. There was never an account as to what happened to that money.
He reworked the land ownership system, where large areas of fertile land were taken back from their previous owners, and given to people friendly with Orban. This resulted in MANY private farmers and agricultures going bankrupt. Keep in mind, this is not a small ordeal – Hungary has historically been an agricultural country, so this was a major blow.
Orban is also an avid fan of football. So much so, that he has build DOZENS and DOZENS of football stadiums all around the country – from government funds. These are not public stadiums, they often belong to local football teams, and people can’t actually use them. These projects each cost between 5-50 million USD.
Orban has recalled the national currency at least 3 times in the past decade. This was obviously to regulate the amount of money in the country, and to directly control inflation. Meanwhile the economy has been stagnating on the same level since the crisis in 2008.
This is the same reason why he hindered previous governments in adopting the Euro - he has been planning to use monetary policies to control the economy.
He made it harder to enter all higher education centers, saying ’we need more workers’.
He made law courses almost entirely unavailable - 50 seats per year -, so that only people sympathetic to the government can get proper law education and become lawyers, judges, etc...
Keep in mind, a leading member of his party only has an honorary college diploma, yet has been the president of the national scientific association, and later the president of the national sports association. Pretty good for a college dropout.
The education system is so useless that this winter 6000 school children were protesting for an educational reform. The government’s response – calling a random kid into national television, and making fun of him. For the record, some of the demands of the students were:
-no classes between 7 am and 8 am
-fix the length of the semesters
-don't decrease the number of seats in higher education
-freedom of speech in schools without a threat of punishment
-a maximal study period of 25 hours/week for elementary schools, and 30 hours/week for highschools.
I don't think these are that outlandish demands - personally, when I finished highschool, I had 40 lessons a week, some of which were from 18:00 to 20:00. That's totally normal for a highschool, right?
Speaking of the TV – the national televisions and news channels are entirely biased. Whenever something inconvenient happens that could damage the reputation of the government, the news just talk about minor stuff, like somebody dying of a car accident, or winning the village goulash making festival.
But let’s talk migration.
I have heard it said that 98% of the Hungarian people voted that they don’t want migrants in their country.
The actual referendum was deliberately worded deceptively.
It asked
„Do you want the EU to deposit non-Hungarian citizens in the country without the permission of the Hungarian Parliament?”
This is a trick question. Nobody wants this, this is like a referendum about abortion asking „do you want to see children murdered?”
So no wonder 4.6 million people refused to participate in the voting, and only 3.6 million voted.
Elections
Another thing I often hear is that Orban was reelected for the 3rd time, with overwhelming support.
Yeah, that’s wrong.
Let’s look at the election system in Hungary!
There are 199 seats in the parliament – 106 are elected representatives in individual voting districts, while 93 are chosen by voting for a particular party, and then said party inserting their own representatives.
As I mentioned, Orban arranged the voting districts in a way that in all but 15 districts (the capital plus 3 other districts) the votes were around 50-51% theirs. Shocking, right? Just enough for victory.
Meanwhile, on the actual election, where people voted for parties, FIDESZ (Orban’s party) reached only 48% overall.
So with this strategy, Orban secured not 48%, but 67% of the votes.
Not nearly as overwhelming a victory as Orban likes to claim.
But that’s not the only thing that’s fishy with the election.
Orban also punished political parties for bullshit reasons during campaigning – one of the major contenders, Jobbik, was fined for around 2 million USD, among others.
For the record, the reason for the fines is that there is a regulation that until a week before the elections, no party can campaign. Most parties get around this by using ambiguous campaigning posters that don't explicitly state which party they stand for. Now, of course this is a tricky business, this is where most opposition parties failed.
And of course, Orban has no problem putting out giant billboards advertising himself, as he has the judges all in his pocket.
Why is all this important? Because while the opposition was struggling financially, Orban used taxpayer money to travel the country, and give live speeches to the uneducated masses. One of the lies he was spreading was that the opposition wants to flood the country with migrants. This is of course not true – the aforementioned Jobbik party for example, is a far right party.
So Orban won by deceiving the rural population with lies, manipulating the voting districts, and disabling the opposition with irrational regulations. Hardly a democratic victory.
Honestly I could go on.
Point is, Viktor Orban has turned a democratic country into his own kingdom, essentially a land ruled by oligarchs and vassals. Young people are bailing the country at a record rate, because the wage standards are quickly sinking compared to neighboring countries. The economy is slowly falling apart, and Orban is syphoning resources out of the country to build his private little kingdom.
I hope you understand now why hailing this man as a hero, or the saviour of Europe, or really anything other than ’thief’ or 'turncoat’ is flawed.
Final words
If you have read the whole thing, I am really grateful. I hope I could provide some perspective to the whole situation. Feel free to ask in the comment section below, or discuss something that's on your mind!
This was my first myTake. I hope you guys are satisfied with the quality. It's a really emotional topic for me, so it is possible that I brushed over some things. Again, if you are confused, just ask.
Have a nice day!
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