Hungarian Speaker of Parliament Kövér calls on Metsola to help ‘prevent undemocratic procedures’ in EP

Speaker of Parliament László Kövér on Monday sent a letter to Roberta Metsola, the newly re-elected President of the European Parliament, congratulating her and asking for her cooperation in “preventing undemocratic procedures in the European Parliament”.

Kövér calls on Metsola to help

Kövér said he agreed with Metsola that parliamentarism needed to be strengthened in Europe, adding that this aim “coincides with the long-standing aspiration of national parliaments to play a greater role in EU decision-making.”

Referring to the Patriots for Europe party group, he said the Hungarian public was “shocked” upon learning that “in violation of the rules of parliamentary democracy and written European law, [the EP] ignored the will of some 18 million European voters and failed to allocate to the third largest political group in the European Parliament any of the vice-presidential or committee office-holder seats that this political group is entitled to according to established practice.”

Kövér said the Hungarian public and MEPs of the ruling Fidesz-Christian Democrat parties “had hoped that, moving beyond the European Parliament’s practices experienced so many times over the past five years, the newly formed European Parliament would value the unity of Europe and break away from the practice of stigmatizing and attempting to exclude those countries, parties, and their MEPs whose opinions and positions, based on democratic mandate, differ on certain issues from the majority view of the European Parliament.”

“Madam President! Since 1990, […] it has been an uninterrupted practice in the Hungarian National Assembly that the parties that have won seats in Parliament by democratic mandate fill parliamentary offices in proportion to their seats. Any politician who has confidence in the democratic values of European popular representation and in the much-vaunted rule of law must ask whether the leadership of the European Parliament considers this exclusionary and divisive situation to be good practice,” Kövér said.

Kövér said “no honest politician with a sincere commitment to democracy” could agree with that “arbitrary procedure”.

Moreover, Kövér said one of the motives behind the “increasingly aggressive attacks” are differing opinions “on the Slavic fratricidal war taking place at the EU’s borders.” He said the EP resolution condemning Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s peace efforts did not align with “the much-vaunted view of EU politicians that the European Union was created to establish peace.”

Should the “discriminatory tendencies” of the past five years continue or strengthen in the EP, rather than an attempt at “reconciling the positions of the Member States based on divergent national interests”, the EU’s capacity to address growing challenges would be further weakened, Kövér said.

“I kindly request Madam President’s future cooperation in preventing any undemocratic procedures within the European Parliament,” Kövér said in conclusion.

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