Fidesz: the EP election list is finalised, the left supports the EU’s “crude political pressure

Tamás Deutsch, who heads Fidesz’s national board, said in a video uploaded to Facebook on Monday that the ruling alliance’s European parliamentary election list has been adopted.

Concerning the upcoming election, Deutsch said “the stakes have never been this high”, with “Brussels bureaucrats inciting war and seeking to force Hungary into the war in Ukraine through political blackmail”. He insisted that the EU’s “pro-war” stance was supported by Hungary’s “dollar Left” parties.

“We Fidesz and Christian Democrat deputies will continue to promote the pro-peace position of Hungarian citizens … just as we reject Brussels’ pro-migration stance,” he said.

“We’ll protect Hungary and will not allow it to be turned into a migrant destination, and reject also Brussels’ gender frenzy,” Deutsch said.

“We’ll protect Hungarian children and will not allow gender ideologists to swarm Hungarian kindergartens and schools,” he said.

On June 9 “we’ll have to sweep out the pro-war, pro-migrant and gender ideologist members of the Brussels bureaucracy together with the Hungarian dollar Left’s pro-Brussels MEPs,” Deutsch added.

You can find the candidates for Fidesz-KDNP HERE.

The exciting thing about the joint list is that while the KDNP and EC leader Von der Leyen, who is under attack by the Hungarian government, belong to the EPP family of parties, Fidesz, having left the EPP, does not belong to any European party.

• read also – Orbán cabinet: Pro-peace and anti-migration shift on the EU stage would not be possible without a shift to the right

Bóka: Left supports ‘raw political pressure’ by EU

The European Commission and the European Parliament have used the EU’s procedures against Hungary “to exert raw political pressure … with the Hungarian leftist parties actively supporting it,” János Bóka, the European affairs minister, said in parliament’s European affairs committee on Tuesday.

“The principle of equal competition is violated if an EU member cannot access EU funds because of such political pressure,” Bóka said. The situation “all the more serious … if that happens because of leftist deputies acting against the national interest,” he added.

“It is now beyond any doubt that Hungary isn’t gaining access to EU funding for political reasons,” he said, adding that the EU procedures against Hungary did not serve European values.

The parliamentary committee is investigating the leftist parties’ activities at the initiative of ruling Fidesz MEP Tamas Deutsch.

Bóka said the freezing of Hungary’s funds had nothing to do with protecting the EU’s financial interests or core values and “everything is to do with the Hungarian government’s stance on the war in Ukraine”.

He insisted that the Hungarian left wing had not “missed a single opportunity” to act against national interests either at home or in Brussels. The Article 7 procedure against Hungary is now in its sixth year, he said, adding that it was unclear what its legal basis or purpose was. Boka said it appeared the procedure was open-ended and was being used to exert pressure on the Hungarian government.

Referring to the application of the conditionality procedure and other moves against Hungary related to the judiciary, he said the government had agreed on 17 measures with the European Commission, but when the agreement was published, the Hungarian left wing launched “an intensive campaign” to put pressure on the EC to change its position.

Noting the opening of so-called horizontal enabling conditions related to the judiciary, he said so far “no concerns have arisen regarding the independence of the Hungarian judiciary”. Once parliament had accepted the negotiated justice package, the left wing again launched a campaign, he insisted, resulting in the European Court of Justice initiating changes to the text of the law whose wording was based on the outcome of the original negotiations, he said.

Bóka also noted pressure on Hungary to join the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, saying this was also a way to exert political pressure on the government. He also mentioned a campaign by left-wing politicians to link the transfer of EU funds to the adoption of “an as yet unspecified educational reform”.

None of these actions, he said, were about protecting European values but rather about putting “crude political pressure” on Hungary. In addition, the Hungarian left, Bóka said, was helping in endeavours to “significantly reduce cohesion resources in the next EU budget cycle”.

• read also: PM Orbán calls on Hungarians in third countries to vote