Prime Minister Péter Magyar urged businesses that benefitted unfairly from contracts awarded under the former Fidesz-KDNP government to repay that money voluntarily in a video message on Facebook on Tuesday.
PM Magyar: “Follow the example of Duna Aszfalt“
“To all of those who, as the anointed of the state, have built up fortunes worth hundreds of billions over the past decade and a half, I have a message: Follow the example of Duna Aszfalt. If public monies went to where they don’t belong, they should be repaid now, voluntarily,” Magyar said.
He warned that later the state would recover those monies anyway, using legal tools. Magyar noted that Duna Aszfalt, a company that won more than HUF 600bn of state contracts in 2018-2020, had decided on Monday to repay early USD 400m of bonds subscribed by the state-owned Magyar Eximbank and Hungarian Development Bank (MFB) to finance a high-risk road project in Africa.
Magyar said the state had reported to authorities more than 20 cases in which public monies exceeding HUF 1,700bn were used inappropriately under the former government. He added that those cases included HUF 640bn of exposure involving a rolling stock order from Egypt and a HUF 360bn state loan for North Macedonia, as well as procurements of alert bracelets for seniors, ambulances, school IT systems and government communications.
Probes and asset recovery
Earlier on Tuesday, he said the foreign ministry had reported a HUF 300bn procurement of ventilators placed during the pandemic under the former head of the portfolio, Péter Szijjártó.
Magyar also highlighted a probe ordered by the government of state contracts with 4iG group as well as efforts to recover assets from public asset management foundations that are not related to higher education. He said that more than HUF 3,000bn had been channeled to the foundations, known by their Hungarian acronym KEKVA, under the Orbán government.
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Magyar said the government measures to recover the assets had been taken even as the National Asset Recovery and Protection Office (NVVH) was in the process of being set up.
He said the opposition Fidesz could try to obstruct the establishment of the office, “but to no avail“. “They, too, know, just as do Orbán’s relatives, that whatever was taken illegally from the common wealth of the Hungarian people will be recovered by the Hungarian state,” he added.
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