Hungarian News

If I can’t rob them I’ll leave the EU

• February 13, 2022
• István
• 10 Comments

Already last year Orbán ordered from his media empire to test out the public reaction on the suggestions to leave EU. His most important “political commentator” took the case seriously, as Éva reported in detail ►EN. The reaction from the population was pretty negative, so Orbán decided not to talk further about.

Next Wednesday the European Court of Justice ECJ will bring the decision of Hungary vs. EU into public in the case of the rule-of-law trial, Orbán started. Already when the day of decision was announced by the court Orbán attacked the judges ►EN, I reported. There is nobody expecting that the ECJ will follow Orbán’s argumentation that the EU mustn’t care for its members following the rules beyond the possibility of the Art. 7 procedure, especially since the advocate general advised the ECK to dismiss the case and in the very most cases the court follows this advice. Orbán has a long list of lost cases when he is fighting against the EU the ECJ never followed the ideological stance of Orbán, but the democratic values.

The same day the ECJ will announce the decision this case will be on the agenda of the European Parliament (EP). Since a year the EP is pressuring the Commission finally to act according to this valid law, while the latter is waiting for the decision. MEP Guy Verhofstadt (RE, BE) already called to replace the entire commission for inactivity. Since a 2/3 majority is needed for this the latest attempt to make the commission to do its work is to freeze the budget of the cabinet of the president of the commission Ursula von der Leyen (EPP, DE.) This can be done with ordinary majority ►DE. Commissioner of justice Věra Jourová (RE, CZ) already said that after the decision of the ECJ things will go fast. The 1st decision could be taken at the EU top in the end of March, the final voting 2 months later, time for defending Orbán definitely will (ab)use in full, since anybody should expect Orbán to accept the verdict after the 1st voting. The vote has to happen in the council (heads of governments and states) with the usual qualified majority, this means at least 15 members with at least 65 % of the population. The 2 allies Orbán still has in the EU are not enough to block the decision. And Slovenia will see a change of government soon, the PM is chairman of the largest coalition party, but the other 3 parties don’t want any more or are expected to vanish from parliament completely. Remains Poland, definitely a problematic partner these days seen the very different view on Russia, which could turn out a breaking point these days.

When he opened the campaign for FIDESZ with his state of the nation speech Orbán told very clearly that the EU is wrong. The EU, Brussels and Berlin must tolerate him to keep the EU together. If the EU would insist to punish Hungary for abolishing the rule of law, which he names a jihad, the consequence would be a reconquista. Of course Orbán has not used correct words. Jihad is the fight of Muslims, daily of every single believer against the bad inside himself or together against an external aggressor, while the reconquista was the period of the unification of Spain, the Moors were driven away from the Hispanic peninsula, and other believes than catholicism became forbidden, which ended in the Spanish inquisition. With other words: If Orbán can’t rob the EU blind he wants to leave. Bad enough there is no full English version of the speech, the regime made only a summery available, of course without the crucial passages. Even among the independent outlets most had just the Hungarian version of the summery, only 444 had this ►HU yesterday. Remarkable is that abroad this has been understood better ►EN (just one example of many). The following quote is from the PM’s Hungarian website, where the full text was made available:

Perhaps it is also worth talking here about why we and Brussels are grinding in two mills, and the Western European intellectual caste, the world of experts, policymakers and opinion leaders. Because we grind in two mills, that is no doubt. We see something different about Europe’s valuable tradition, we think differently about the future of nations, nation-states, something else about globalisation, and now we think differently about the family as well, and we even got to the conclusion that society is binary, we think differently about its structure based on women and men. And because this is as it is, we inevitably imagine a different kind of future we wish for ourselves and our children as well. And I want to make it clear that we will not give in here. On April 3rd we will defend our children with a referendum, the father is a man, the mother is a woman, and leave our children alone!

I don’t want their sympathy, but the truth is that I am working with them for thirty years now, and I see it like this, in my personal observation that lies deeply in the differences that we lived completely differently in and therefore interpret the end of the Cold War differently than they do, the Western countries not occupied by the Soviets, including America. That’s what’s behind it. It is about the fact that they did not live in a dictatorship and that they – as Márai said – they inherited the freedom. We, on the other hand, lived in it, in the dictatorship, and we did not get the freedom, but fought for it. We do not underestimate the contribution of the West, but it is as clear to us as the sun, the Cold War was won by the Poles, the Czechs, the Hungarians, the Germans, the Bulgarians, the Romanians, the Estonians, the Latvians, and the Lithuanians, or to say it differently by us. We know that anti-communism and the idea of the nation won the Cold War by restoring the nation-states. We think the nation has won over the class, the faith in god over atheism, and private property over socialist state property. They think about something completely different. They think that their liberal democracy has won over communism. In their heads, neither now nor then, not the nation-states, but the global world stays central, controlled by global organisations, institutions, and networks, connected by global commercial and techno-communications networks. That’s why György Soros is honestly their hero, of course the tiny one can’t do wrong. That is why we are not on the edge of the rule of law and democracy. We all know that we live in a constitutional system of the rule of law that is clearly laid down and protected by the Basic Law. For them, the rule of law is a mean by which they can knead us to their liking. Therefore, they are not even interested in the facts or our arguments. They are now waging a holy war, a jihad of the rule of law. However, my friends, word hardly help against a jihad. We have to show power here, so the reconquista comes! The same is true about democracy. They see the destruction and slippage of democracy, wherein we spend our daily lives. With elections, a referendum, a virulent left-wing press and sharp political debates. They are like the woman in the Freudian joke fleeing this terrifying shadow that haunts her. When the shadow catches up, the woman asks with dying voice, “What do you want from me?” To what is the shadow: “Me? After all you are dreaming about me!” That’s how we stand together, and the truth is, we don’t want to be like them, and we can hardly believe that they want to be like us. It doesn’t make sense denying the differences. This debate is inevitable within the Western world. The debate of course is important, but not the most important. The most important is whether we want to stay together. Especially here in Europe, because the European Union only has a future if we can stay together despite our growing cultural alienation. For our part, we want to keep the European Union together. That is why we have made several offers of tolerance to Brussels and to Berlin as well. We do not wait for them to embrace on European level the Hungarian emigration policy, the Hungarian family policy or the Hungarian foreign and nationality policy, but they cannot demand that we take over theirs either. There is no other solution but tolerance. Only in this way can we find a common way, and the Union must go forward, not backward as well.

Emphasis by me. The full speech is found here ►HU.

It is again the old problem. Orbán joined a tennis club, stole the balls and rackets, just to complain constantly that they don’t play soccer there. It would be honest to tell the people that he doesn’t share the values of the EU and that he doesn’t want to follow any rules that don’t serve his personal interest.

Orbán has shown again that he has no clue about democracy. Democracy is always free, never “illiberal,” which translates to unfree in plain English.. Elections are an important cornerstone of democracy, but having elections doesn’t mean that a state is democratic. Horthy, Rákosi and Kádár held elections as well! The more as the entire electoral system is created in favour of a single party. It belongs so much more to be democratic, in 1st instance not to monopolise power. Electing an absolute monarch doesn’t constitute a democracy.

And Referendums? This could be another cornerstone, but not if a referendum is only allowed to penetrate the country with hateful propaganda, even illegal, since the propaganda referendum cannot be used to instruct the parliament to pass an exact piece of legislation. In other states the government has to put important questions to the people, for example to confirm a change of constitution. But this is expressively forbidden by Orbán’s private basic law. In fact since 2010 not a single referendum initiated by the people was voted about, the parliament only granted to hold referendums for propaganda.

Virulent left press? A dead left press perhaps. And papers that have not been killed as Népszabadság have been bought and brought ideologically on Orbán line. Népszava is the only remaining printed newspaper on the left, new Magyar Hang, although far from being left, needs to be printed abroad, because the regime doesn’t allow this happening in Hungary. Also on the internet the regimes tries to control the media. Latest example we may talk about is the Orbánisation of index, although it never has been really left, but non-partisan. TV? Radio? All regime controlled with the exception of RTL, which keeps equal distance.

A sharp political debate? Well, Orbán finally should ask Péter Márki-Zay to have one! In a country where the major opposition force needs to rely on facebook for broadcasting the campaign start, an event that hasn’t been mentioned with a single word on “public” TV, while Orbán’s campaign start as “Gyurcsány and Bajnai want to return” was the 1st and most important news item, but not only this, it was broadcasted in full on MTV1. But MZP has been mentioned, he would be attacking women. As proof MTV1 showed an interview he gave during the primaries where he said that Klára Dobrev is a great politician, a woman and this would work in her favour. Brutal? Yes! Debate? Not even close!

I have the idea that the way Orbán talks on behalf the Balitc states, Germany, the Czech Republic, Romania, or Bulgaria is exactly the contrary of what the people or the governments of these states want. Orbán not even talks on behalf of the Hungarians, where 86 % are happy with EU membership, and according to most recent data 64 % sees advantages to increase the depth of co-operation by introduction of the Euro, even among FIDESZ voters this is 51 % ►HU. Reconquista. Re-conquering Europe, ruling over all of it and introducing a thought police? Besides the stupidity of the re in reconquista: how to re-conquer the rest of Europe? Even with the states on his list it would be impossible to archive a change in the EU. This will remain the secret of Orbán.

Sometimes I hate it to be right, but when the discussions about no longer financing this regime I said that Orbán’s reaction would be Hungary leaving the EU.