Minister Bóka: Hungary wants to be the catalyst of change in Europe

János Bóka, the European affairs minister, told a parliamentary committee on Monday that Hungary “wants to be the catalyst of change” in Europe.

Speaking at an annual hearing before the European affairs committee, Bóka said 2024 has been a year of “institutional and political transition” for the community, which “offers an opportunity for change”. “Hungary wants to be the voice of that change,” he said.

According to Bóka, change is needed because the EU “cannot guarantee security for Europe and its immediate vicinity”. The community has been unable to come up with a “real strategy” concerning the war in Ukraine; it has only been “drifting with the events” while “spending an increasing portion of its resources on this conflict”, he said.

The EU cannot ensure the community’s welfare, either, with companies “struggling with overregulation and bureaucracy that negatively impact their competitiveness,” Boka added.

He said European companies paid two or three times as much for electricity and four to five times more for natural gas than their competitors. “Therefore we cannot speak about real global competitiveness,” the minister said, adding that the EU was facing “the greatest crisis in its history”.

The EU cannot stop illegal migration, nor can it “provide agriculture with a future perspective,” Bóka said, adding that the community had been struggling with those problems for more than a decade. “The EU cannot come up with solutions, and that raises issues of personal and institutional responsibility,” Bóka said.

While last summer’s European Parliament elections reflected a demand for change, “incumbent leaders and institutional structures cannot be expected to come up with new directions,” he said. “We must force the change to happen … if possible, in cooperation with EU institutions, if not, even in opposition with them,” Bóka said, and called for a “constructive opposition approach”.

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