All ministries to cancel contracts with Magyar Telekom – Update

Budapest, December 17 (MTI) – The government has instructed all ministries and their institutions to cancel their contracts with Magyar Telekom, the local unit of Deutsche Telekom, government spokesman Zoltan Kovacs told MTI.

Kovacs said that the move would affect mobile internet subscriptions, but added that cancellations of the contracts would not impact the partnership agreement between Telekom and the Hungarian government. Kovacs also added that exact number of such contracts with ministries and their agencies was being surveyed.

Kovacs said the move comes as a response to Magyar Telekom’s decision to cancel its sponsorship agreement with Hungarian pop singer Akos Kovacs over comments he made about the role of women in society.

“The role of women is not to make as much money as men,” the singer said in an interview with television channel Echo. When asked what the role of women was, the singer said it was “belonging to someone, giving birth … being mothers”.

The government spokesman said Magyar Telekom’s cancelling of Akos Kovacs’s sponsorship agreement goes against “both the spirit and the letter” of the constitution. “Such a move might be acceptable in Germany, but we believe it is unacceptable to discriminate against someone for their beliefs like this in Hungary.”

House Speaker Laszlo Kover also said last week that Hungarian women should consider giving birth the “highest form of self-fulfillment”.

According to the opposition Socialists, the move signals an “advanced level of customised government”. Socialist leader Jozsef Tobias said that while the government overlooked a “collapsing” health care system, it put on its agenda such items as a “medieval” remark “by a citizen” degrading women into second-rate residents. He insisted that Fidesz’s “minions” could in any awkward situation rely on the government’s “even more awkward” support.

The Egyutt (Together) party said that the government’s “petty revenge” was indicative of its sharing the pop singer’s “one-sided” views about women.

In its statement, Egyutt noted that Telekom was a privately owned company, which could sponsor anyone, while the government will terminate “public procurement contracts negotiated using taxpayers’ money”.

While Akos Kovacs has the right to have his own view of the world, it is unacceptable that the ruling parties should adopt those views as a government policy, Egyutt said, adding that the government spokesman was referring to the freedom of opinion as a “hypocritical and false” excuse.

The Liberal Party said in a statement that the move could not be taken in any rule of law. They said the government’s “retaliation” was triggered by a “personal insult to the prime minister’s favourite singer and friend”. The government of a democratic country must not take revenge because a private company disagrees with the views of the house speaker or a pop star, and refuses to support or share their position.

“Orban will inflict punishment, which conveys the message that anyone will be punished if they refuse to share the hypocritical values of Fidesz and have a different opinion,” the Liberal statement said.

The Dialogue for Hungary (PM) party said that the prime minister “had better focus on the country’s problems rather than those of his favourite musician”. In a statement sent to MTI, PM called on the government to respect the decisions of private companies and spare efforts to “protect their minion who has elicited a public uproar”.

A spokesman for the green LMP party said that the government was “again mixing up private and public interests”. Retaliating for “alleged or actual” offences on artists close to the government is not a government responsibility, Jozsef Gal said in his statement

Photo: http://www.hwsw.hu/

Source: http://mtva.hu/hu/hungary-matters