Dialogue for Hungary (Párbeszéd Magyarországért)

Coronavirus – Párbeszéd welcomes emergency measures, DK and Jobbik blames Orbán caibinet for delay

Daily News Hungary

The opposition Párbeszéd party has welcomed that the government declared a state of emergency with regard to the coronavirus epidemic on Wednesday, while the Democratic Coalition (DK) said the measures should have been introduced much earlier.

Párbeszéd

Tímea Szabó, Párbeszéd’s parliamentary leader, told a press conference that introduction of a state of emergency was a good start for preparations, should the situation aggravate. Szabó, however, asked why the government had not ordered the closure of schools similarly to 15 other European Union members. She argued that while children did not typically get sick, they could pass on the virus. She called on the government to work out protocols for parents who may have to stay at home with their children in case of a possible schools ban, and suggested that such parents should receive their full salaries.

Szabó also called on the government to provide primary health care staff with protective gear and disinfectants, and insisted that health care services would collapse if too many general practitioners got sick.

On another subject, Szabó said it was not clear if the “tens of thousands” of guest workers returning from Italy and travelling across Hungary were screened for coronavirus. Referring to press reports, she said that

passangers on flights from Italy in the past few days had not been subjected to any screening, and demanded that the earlier strict controls should be restored.

DK

Csaba Molnár, DK’s executive deputy leader, said that the government’s declaring a state of emergency was “the result of a nervous rush” and accused the government of trying to belittle the problem for weeks. Molnár insisted that recent government reports had suggested that “there is enough health care capacity, there are enough face masks, enough respirators and all is in the best order”, while the government’s “giving itself the broadest powers under the constitution” on Wednesday constitute “a clear and serious contradiction”.

The government is “in full panic”,

Molnár said, adding that “while a week or ten days ago such an announcement would have suggested a readiness to take action, now it is telling people that the government is not in control of the situation”.

Jobbik

Conservative Jobbik leader Péter Jakab called for a “public health border seal” and demanded that foreign nationals should only be allowed to enter the country if they had a written certificate of their non-infectious status.

In a Facebook entry, Jakab said that

creches, kindergartens and schools should be closed.

He argued that such measures could reduce the spread of the virus by up to one thirds, and said that leaving those insitutions open could jeopardise the health of both children and parents.

Jakab also warned that “hundreds of thousands” of illegal migrants in Turkey could set off for Europe, with the Turkish media suggesting that they could cross the “less controlled” Romania-Hungary border.

He said it was an open question how many of those migrants could be infected, adding that it was crucial that the government should reestablish the border guards.

“The border should be controlled by border guards. This is an issue of public security and public health,” he added.

Budapest mayor: Opposition should stay focused on future

Budapest-Mayor-Gergely-Karácsony

Hungary’s opposition parties can only be successful in the next general election if they stay focused on the future, rather than “trying to return to the pre-2010 world”, Budapest Mayor Gergely Karácsony said on Sunday.

“The opposition shouldn’t be competing in who hates [Prime Minister] Viktor Orbán more or how many likes they get when they lure away another party’s politician,” Karácsony, the co-leader of liberal Párbeszéd told an event focused on green policy.

The opposition would attract more votes if it were capable of presenting a worldview of its own, the mayor said, adding, at the same time, that voters today were only capable of retaining the government’s messaging.

“They can barely say anything about the kind of world the opposition would strive to create if it came into power,” he said.

Karácsony said this meant that the opposition had to be responsible when shaping and implementing policy measures. Since there are three million Hungarians living in municipalities governed by the opposition, he said, the parties had an opportunity to enact policies but were also faced with the possibility of failure.

Karácsony said the opposition had to offer “responsible, 21st-century green and left-wing policies”.

He said the opposition should conduct primaries before they put together their 2022 candidate list, arguing that last year’s local elections had shown that an election victory required collaboration with civil groups and local organisations.

Tímea Szabó, Párbeszéd’s other co-leader, said the difference between true green parties and “those who only brandish themselves as green” was that “real greens” were ready to spend to meet the needs of the people.

Independent lawmaker Bernadett Szél said climate change would create “a new order” in Hungarian politics.

“National populism has no answer to the real problems and does nothing but leech off of people’s poverty,” she said.

Opposition parties react to PM Orbán’s address

PM Orbán

Opposition parties gave their reactions to the prime minister’s state-of-the-nation address in which Viktor Orbán laid out in detail his government’s climate protection action plan and its goals to continue developing the country, on Sunday.

Conservative Jobbik said that

the prime minister “has left Hungarians workers and pensioners on their own”.

“In the green policy unveiled, the country’s first man seems to be interested in the so-called green government bond,” the leader of the party said in a statement. Hungarians are however more interested to know how the government plans to protect their families from the effects of an economic crisis, but heard nothing from the prime minister about that, Péter Jakab said. He said

Jobbik proposed that the government should have spent the hundreds of billions of forints it spent on “the hate campaign wrapped up in its national consultation survey” on increasing wages and pensions.

orbán state of the nation
Read alsoOrbán: Hungary’s last ten years most successful decade of past century

Bertalan Tóth, the leader of the Socialists, called Orbán “a one-man fake news factory”. Viktor Orbán gave an outline of “a parallel world he has envisioned and created, a world that is about his own achievements,” Tóth said in a video message. But, he added, the prime minister had failed “to say a word about the life of the average Hungarian”.

Ferenc Gyurcsány, a former Socialist prime minister and the leader of the Democratic Coalition, said “democratic Hungary has never been as divided as it is now”. He said the country is “now dictated by party state and party logic rather than nation or national governance”.

“In the past ten years Hungary became a loser and lost its friends in the community of European nations,”

Gyurcsány said in a statement, adding that Orbán evaluated the past year, but the final evaluation about him would be given by the Hungarian people.

The Párbeszéd party said in a statement that the prime minister had no answer to Hungary’s health-care, education or housing problems. In a statement, the party said that instead of solutions, Orbán had diverted attention from what was important with a national consultation survey “again costing billions”.

Green LMP said

the climate protection measures announced by the prime minister should have been taken a long time ago and were not in line with current challenges.

LMP can only believe the government if it makes immediate substantive changes in the areas of environment and nature protection, party co-leader Erzsébet Schmuck said in a statement. She called for a ministry of climate and sustainability to be set up and for funds in the central budget to be allocated towards those two areas.

orbán state of the nation
Read alsoHungary ‘still here’ 100 years after WWI Trianon Peace Treaty, says Orbán

Joint opposition candidate wins by-election in Dunaújváros

kálló gergely mp jobbik

Gergely Kálló, the joint candidate of the opposition Jobbik, Democratic Coalition, LMP, Socialist, Momentum and Párbeszéd parties, won a by-election in Dunaújváros, in central Hungary, on Sunday.

The local ballot was held in a constituency for the mandate of Tamás Pintér, a former lawmaker of conservative Jobbik since April 2018 who was elected mayor of the city in the municipal elections last October.

Data released by the National Election Office after the ballot with 98.77 percent of the votes counted showed that

Kálló was elected with 56.29 percent of the vote, receiving 10,897 votes.

Tibor Molnár, an independent candidate backed by ruling Fidesz, came second, with 37.72 percent (7,302 votes), followed by Renáta Sürü, also an independent with 2.93 percent (568 votes).

Voter turnout was 28.87 percent in the city with 67,471 eligible voters.

Peter Jakab elected Jobbik leader
Read alsoFormer Hungarian radical party Jobbik elected new president with Jewish roots

Opposition calls for scrapping national curriculum amendment

Hungarians

The opposition Párbeszéd party will submit a proposal to parliament to scrap amendments to the national curriculum (NAT), which the government published last Friday.

The draft “reflects the [ruling] Fidesz party’s far-right ideology,” Párbeszéd lawmaker Bence Tordai said, insisting the curriculum was not fit for setting the direction for public education.

Tordai accused Fidesz of “trying to push through its radical right-wing ultraconservative ideology” when it came to the teaching of Hungarian literature and history.

The lawmaker called on the government to consult professional organisations with a view to forming a consensus-based, high-quality curriculum.

kids children student school education in hungary
Read alsoHere is the new National Core Curriculum in Hungary

Meanwhile, Democratic Coalition (DK) deputy group leader Gergely Arató acused state secretary Bence Rétvári of “going beyond the pale” in a dispute concerning NAT by attacking “a professional organisation of high repute”. Arato cited a Facebook entry by Rétvári stating that it was “no surprise” that the association of history teachers had made “hair-raising comments” about the curriculum, “given the support they had received from US financier George Soros for years”.

Arató accused Rétvári of presenting the history teachers’ association as “Soros agents”, adding that the government’s attitude towards professional organisations was “shocking and unacceptable”.

school boys education
Read alsoWhat is wrong with the Hungarian education system?

The state secretary for public education, Zoltán Maruzsa, said in reaction that the opposition’s criticism was nothing new. “They are against everything that strengthens national identity because they do not want to preserve the Europe of nations. Instead, they want to create a Europe full of migrants, one without identity, with weak nation states and gender [neutral] schools in which students don’t get to have either a national or a gender identity,” he said.

“We don’t want this,” he added.

Reacting to criticism over certain authors included in the curriculum, he said Albert Wass already featured in the curriculum drawn up in 2012, and he insisted that Jozsef Nyiro — who critics note was a one-time member of the Arrow-Cross Party — had authored several classics of Szekler literature. Imre Kertesz’s novel Fatelessness will be included in the framework curriculum sets out the detailed regulation of the National Core Curriculum, he added.

NAT was amended through lengthy preparation and consultations, and is expected to reduce the drop-out rate, Maruzsa said.

Hungarian opposition parties slam government nuclear, sustainable energy policy

paks

The opposition LMP and Párbeszéd parties on Tuesday slammed what they called the government’s anti-wind power policy and the upgrade of Hungary’s sole nuclear plant in Paks, in central Hungary.

Speaking at a joint press conference of the green LMP and the Párbeszéd parties, Párbeszéd lawmaker Olivio Kocsis-Cake said the government was calling for a “Christian, conservative green policy” of which nuclear energy is an important element but that snubs wind power. Such a green policy, in Párbeszéd’s view, does not exist, Kocsis-Cake said.

Kocsis-Cake said

the government policy was dragging its foot in phasing out traditional energy production and introducing sustainable energy production.

The 4,000 billion forints (EUR 11.8bn) allocated for the upgrade of the Paks power plant should be ploughed into energy efficiency programmes and sustainable forms of energy, he said.

The lawmaker called for the nuclear power plant that is currently operating to be moth-balled at the end of its lifecycle, adding that planned additional reactor blocks under the Paks 2 project were unnecessary.

Párbeszéd has submitted proposals to parliament on setting up an independent ministry for environmental protection and on scrapping a decision the party says effectively “bans” building wind power turbines, he said.

Péter Ungár, the lawmaker of green LMP, noted the government has failed to give an explanation for banning the construction of further wind turbines, a cheap source of energy.

Meanwhile, the costs of the Paks upgrade grow year by year, Ungar added.

POLL: Fidesz-ChristDem alliance maintains lead

ORBÁN Viktor

The ruling alliance of Fidesz and the Christian Democrats has maintained its lead in January, with 50 percent of decided voters declaring support in a Nézőpont poll published on Tuesday.

Support for the non-parliamentary liberal opposition Momentum Movement was 13 percent, while both the conservative Jobbik party and the leftist Democratic Coalition (DK) stood at 10 percent.

Five percent backed the Socialist-Párbeszéd alliance, well below the 10 percent threshold needed to get into parliament on a joint party list, and 4 percent supported the green LMP party.

As for the other non-parliamentary parties, the satirical Two-tailed Dog Party (MKKP) and radical nationalist Mi Hazánk chalked up 4 percent and 3 percent respectively, below the 5 percent threshold for seats.

Among all voters, the ruling alliance stood at 41 percent.

On the opposition side, none of the parties could attract two-digit support among all voters. Jobbik was backed by 8 percent, and DK by 7 percent. The Socialist-Párbeszéd alliance and MKKP were supported by 4 percent each. LMP garnered 3 percent and Mi Hazánk 2 percent among all voters.

Nézőpont interviewed a representative sample of 1,000 respondents over the phone between January 10 and 16.

Hungary marks Holocaust Remembrance Day

holocaust Hungary

Csaba Latorcai, state secretary at the human resources ministry, attended a commemoration marking International Holocaust Remembrance Day at Budapest’s Holocaust Documentation Centre on Monday.

In his address, Latorcai advocated “learning from the past, gaining strength from the sacrifice of the victims of 20th century dictatorships and from the example of those who saved lives”.

“It is up to us whether we promote peace or allow unrest to take over the world around us,” he said.

Tamas Kovács, head of the centre, noted that one third of the people who died in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp had been deported from Hungary. “Their only sin was being Jewish or Roma, or being unwanted for some other reason,” he added.

Latorcai praised the government’s “achievements in preserving the memory of the Holocaust”. He said government measures in the past 9 years “put the assessment of those dark periods in Hungary’s history on new foundations” and helped build an environment in which there is an “unprecedented blossoming of Jewish culture”, while “Hungary means security for Jews in Europe”.

queen elizabeth II royal england
Read alsoQueen Elizabeth II to award Hungarian Holocaust survivors

He called it alarming, however, that Europe, “whose identity has for centuries been determined by traditions of a Christian-Jewish culture” is “about to take a hazardous path which could destroy those foundations”.

“Unless we cooperate and stop that trend in time, a world similar to the godless dictatorships of the 20th century may come, in which the self-determination of nations and peoples is not tolerated, religious roots are upturned and the continent is forced to give up its culture,” he said.

Addressing the same commemoration, Israeli Ambassador to Hungary Yakov Hadas-Handelsman warned that anti-Semitism was again on the rise across the world.

He said xenophobia went hand in hand with Holocaust denial and relativisation. He said anti-Semitism was not only a problem for Jews but also for societies where it appeared because it could lead to other kinds of discrimination and hatred that affect minorities. Fighting anti-Semitism, he added, was in the interest of the world rather than just a Jewish interest, he added.

Vladimir Sergeev, Russia’s ambassador to Hungary, said

he was proud of the “fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers” who had served in the Red Army and liberated Auschwitz-Birkenau and the Budapest ghetto.

He noted that some 50,000 Soviet soldiers died during the siege of Budapest, while about as many are buried across Hungary. “They gave their lives, and we are obliged never to forget what happened in the 1930s and 1940s,” he said.

In a statement, the Socialist Party said people needed reminding of their shared responsibility not to allow a repeat of “history’s darkest period”.

Democratic Coalition leader Ferenc Gyurcsány noted on Facebook that as prime minister he had visited the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC.

“I stood there pondering that my predecessors, in violation of their most basic political, human oath, had failed to protect the country’s citizens, instead sending them to their deaths like animals.”

LMP said in a statement that the protection of human dignity did not encompass physical violence only, but written, verbal and political propaganda, too.

holocaust Hungary
Read alsoHungary marks Holocaust Remembrance Day

The Hungarian Liberal Party noted that more than 400,000 Hungarian Jews were deported and murdered, aided by the Hungarian authorities, from 1941 to 1945, and one in three of the million people murdered in Auschwitz-Birkenau was Hungarian.

“The anti-Jewish laws passed by the Hungarian Parliament paved the way to these brutal murders,” it added.

Párbeszed warned against forgetting “the tragic, inhuman consequences of exclusion, discrimination and judgement”. World leaders and everyone should be vigilant in rejecting incitement to hatred, it added.

Opposition MP slams Orbán’s ‘populist’ economic policy

Daily News Hungary

Párbeszéd lawmaker Tamás Mellár has slammed the government’s “populist economic policy”, saying it relied on artificial means to keep Hungary’s annual GDP growth rate at around 4-5 percent.

Citing the preliminary 2021 and 2022 budget figures, Mellár told a press conference on Monday that Hungary’s economic growth was based on a threefold increase in government spending. But he warned that this policy would eventually result in an overheated and distorted economy.

Mellár said

the government was laying the foundations of Hungary’s “fragile bubble economy” on the construction sector.

“It’s pouring money into iron, steel and concrete instead of technological developments that would increase exports,” he said.

Still, he said the biggest problem was the uneven distribution of the benefits of the country’s growth. The assets of private bankers increased by 20 percent last year, Mellár said, adding that this wealth was concentrated in the hands of a mere 47,000 people. “But there’s no funding available for quality growth,” he said.

Párbeszéd MP Mellár said

the government’s economic policy would not improve Hungary’s level of competitiveness, arguing that it impeded the development of small and medium-sized companies while causing corporations to become unaccustomed to competition due to their positions of monopoly.

Funding for the education and training of a quality workforce is also lacking, he said.

Opposition Párbeszéd protests against new social benefits law

Daily News Hungary

The opposition Párbeszéd party on Monday staged a protest at the president’s office against a new law tightening social benefit rules.

The law passed last week rolls pensions, health-care, labour-market and in-kind contributions into one from next year. Under the new law, private individuals who do not pay health insurance for three consecutive months will be barred from making use of state health-care services.

At the protest,

Párbeszéd lawmaker Bence Tordai called the law “shameful and inhumane”.

More than a million Hungarian citizens are at risk of losing eligibility to state health-care services, he said, adding that every ninth citizen may end up only receiving emergency care on condition it is paid for in advance.

Tordai said

people most at risk were the poorest unable to pay for health-care services, leading to irreversible illness.

The Hungarian Chamber of Doctors and trade union federation MASZSZ, alongside Párbeszed, have asked President János Áder not to sign the law and return it to parliament for a review. Read more HERE.

At the protest, Párbeszéd placed a coffin in front of the president’s office.

Socialists: Opposition cooperation opportunity to draft programme for 2022 election

opposition cooperation

Socialist party leader Bertalan Tóth said on Saturday that cooperation between a variety of opposition parties offers an opportunity to draft a “programme of national minimum” for the 2022 general election.

Speaking at a press conference wrapping up the year 2019, Tóth said the joint opposition has the chance to implement a programme containing the “national minimum” in education, health care, social services and the rule of law.

The opposition’s success in the October local election also justifies the pre-selections held ahead of the vote and the strategy of fielding a single joint candidate against ruling Fidesz, Tóth said, adding that those methods should be employed at the next general election, too.

Ágnes Kunhalmi, head of the party board, said 2019 was a “crucial and successful” year. However, the challenges ahead are even greater, she said.

Fidesz “will not rest until it can drive a wedge between the cooperation opposition parties”, she said, adding that the latter should close ranks even more. In the 2022 election campaign, the opposition should field one candidate in each constituency, set up a single list and back a single candidate for prime minister, she said.

“Those not supporting the joint list are endangering the victory of Hungarian democrats,” she said.

Budapest Mayor Gergely Karácsony, who as a Socialist-Párbeszéd candidate was elected with the backing of multiple opposition parties in October, said that election was the greatest opposition victory in a decade. In the two months since, the new leadership laid the groundwork for a socially inclusive Budapest, he said: the city has suspended the implementation of implementing the “slave law” of increased overtimes, suspended evictions and acquired 50 billion forints to develop outpatient care as well as made public transport free of charge for jobseekers, he said.

Hungarian parliament passes culture bill

parliament-Socialists

Lawmakers on Wednesday passed a package of laws on cultural activity that creates the conditions for the establishment of local council-run theatres, state theatres and theatres with a mixed operating structure.

The bill submitted to parliament on Monday was passed in a fast-tracked legislative procedure with 115 votes in favour, 53 against and 3 abstentions.

The legislation regulates the set of culturally strategic institutions in the various cultural sectors, declaring that their operations are to be financed from the central budget.

It also formally establishes a National Cultural Council that will be responsible for the sector’s strategic management.

Furthermore, the law declares that the upkeep of cultural institutions will be the full responsibility of their managers.

Under the law, local council-run theatres will be financed from the local council’s budget and state theatres from the central budget.

Local councils will also be able to submit a request to the government on running theatres under a mixed operating structure. If the request is approved, the minister of human resources and the local council will sign an agreement on the theatre’s joint operation.

The agreement will have to guarantee the theatre’s artistic freedom and cover the rules pertaining to its operation.

Protesters rallied in downtown Budapest against the government's new culture bill on Monday evening.
Read alsoProtesters rally against government’s culture bill in Budapest demonstration

In an act of protest, MPs of the Párbeszed, Socialist Party and Democratic Coalition groups stood up during the vote and held up black masks in front of their faces.

At a press conference held jointly by the Socialists, DK, LMP and Párbeszed, Socialist MP István Hiller said the legislation curtailed artistic freedom and cultural autonomy. He criticised the government’s argument that local councils that want theatres should be responsible for operating them on their own, saying that recent government measures had made it impossible for local councils to finance their own theatres.

DK’s parliamentary group spokesman Zsolt Gréczy said Prime Minister Viktor Orbán was making “bad and abominable decisions” after the “hit he took” in October’s municipal elections.

“The prime minister hasn’t understood that Budapesters had also voted on cultural freedom, the freedom of thought and artistic autonomy [in the elections] and want no part of any partisan control,” he said.

LMP’s Péter Ungár called it an “illegitimate” decision that Human Resources Minister Miklós Kásler will have a say in the appointment of theatre directors. He said theatres belonged to their respective communities and local councils were entitled to appointing their directors.

Párbeszéd deputy group leader Bence Tordai decried the package as a “black day for Hungarian culture”. He said the legislation would only constitute a law in the eyes of the Fidesz-Christian Democrat alliance, “whereas for us and others it’s a diktat and we don’t obey diktats”.

New Budapest Mayor Karácsony outlines ‘fundamental values’ for Budapest leadership

Budapest Mayor Gergely Karácsony

Gergely Karácsony, Budapest’s new mayor, has set out the mottoes which he said would guide the city’s leadership in the next five-year municipal cycle.

Speaking at the new municipal assembly‘s first meeting after his oath-taking, Karácsony said there should not be any “second-class” citizens in the city.

He said municipal leaders must serve the interests of residents.

Further, people have a fundamental right to a roof over their heads, he said.

Also, the city will contribute towards efforts to combat climate change. City leaders, he said, will work to protect Budapest’s architectural heritage and natural environment, and preference will be given to sustainable forms of transport.

Karácsony called for a balance between the development of inner districts and the outskirts.

He also signalled the promotion of the city’s cultural diversity.

The mayor pledged that city leaders will consult residents on all major issues. The city’s operations must be transparent and free of corruption, he added.

The new assembly will build “a new kind of cooperation” both with the districts and the central government, Karacsony said. The capital “must not be subordinate to any government” but an equal partner, he insisted.

“Nobody must decide about Budapest residents without their contribution, nobody must strip them of what is theirs and nobody must deprive Budapest of its future,” he said, adding that “Budapest will not allow its autonomy to be restricted”.

The general assembly elected as deputy mayors DK’s Erzsébet Németh Gy, Kata Tüttő of the Socialist party, Dávid Dorosz of Párbeszéd, political scientist Ambrus Kiss who sits in the assembly as an independent, and Gábor Kerpel-Fronius of the Momentum movement.

Budapest's new deputy mayors
Budapest’s new deputy mayors. Photo: MTI

It also accepted amendments to the authority’s organisational and operational regulations enabling the mayor to propose to the assembly to fast-track submitted bills. It also decided to set up a committee for climate and environmental protection.

Meanwhile, Csaba Horváth, the mayor of the 14th district, told a press conference that the Socialists have the most representatives in the new Budapest assembly.

“Budapest will no longer be in opposition; a new majority has been formed,” he said before the assembly meeting.

The Budapest general assembly consists of 33 members: the directly elected mayor, the mayors of the capital city’s 23 districts and 9 representatives who have won their mandates via compensation party lists.

The opposition parties have 17 representatives: 7 Socialist, 4 Democratic Coalition (DK), 4 Momentum and 2 Párbeszéd. The Fidesz-Christian Democrats have 13 representatives while 3 sit as independents.

Karácsony was backed in the local election by Momentum, DK, the Socialist Party alliance with Párbeszéd and LMP.

Local elections – International press reacts to Karácsony’s win

Mark Ruffalo, Karácsony, elections, Hungary

Last night, the local elections and the campaigns came to an end in every Hungarian region. There was a massive surprise in the capital, where Gergely Karácsony from the left party won. Not only Hungarians but international politicians and other prominent persons congratulated the new mayor of Budapest as well.

HVG reported that American actor Mark Ruffalo, international star of the Avengers movies, tweeted on his official platform that a new era is coming to Hungary.

The actor included an article by Washington Post to his post in which the writer shares details about the winning of Gergely Karácsony.

Although Ruffalo did not write Karácsony’s name in his post, undoubtedly, his post is a message to him. The American actor also stated a few weeks before that Viktor Orbán leads the country just like the president of the United States, Donald Trump does. 

24. hu reported that Michael Ludwig, mayor of Vienna, congratulated Karácsony on his official Facebook site and looks forward to working with the brand-new mayor of the Hungarian capital.

Ludwig stated that Vienna and Budapest became stronger and stronger throughout history, and now they can cooperate as well.

https://www.facebook.com/MichaelLudwig.at/photos/a.329704963873737/1325273334316890/?type=3&theater

Hungarian actor Róbert Alföldi wrote that a new world is coming with the election of Karácsony and this world leads back to Europe.

https://www.facebook.com/alfoldirobert/photos/a.1602619089971242/2533203193579489/?type=3&theater

Daily News Hungary reported about every step of the local election process. Find articles related to this topic by CLICKING HERE

Featured image: Wikimedia Commons by Gage Skidmore 

Scarlett Johansson: “I did not express my support to Budapest Mayor Tarlós for the upcoming municipal elections”

Two weeks ago, the rightist media turned up with the breaking news that the world-famous Hollywood actress, Scarlett Johansson visited the 71-year-old Lord Mayor, István Tarlós (representing FIDESZ), who runs for reelection this month.

READ MORE HERE

Local elections – Results in major Hungarian cities

local elections result

Among others, Péter Márki-Zay has been reelected as the mayor of Hódmezővásárhely with all the votes counted, according to the National Election Office.

László Botka, reelected for the fifth time as the mayor of the city of Szeged in Sunday’s local elections — this time as a joint opposition candidate — said the community of the southern Hungarian city, the country’s third biggest, were the real winners.

Botka said he did not consider running the city to be a political task, adding that he intended to serve all the residents of Szeged.

Everyone should feel at home in the city, the Socialist politician added.

He said his first task would be to consult with all municipal representatives on how they conceive of working together.

Ruling Fidesz’s László Papp attributed his reelection as the mayor of eastern Hungary’s Debrecen on Sunday to “the serious, diligent work carried out over the past five years”.

“Another breakthrough victory has been achieved,” the mayor of Hungary’s second biggest city said, noting that Fidesz’s candidates had also won in all of the city’s individual electoral districts.

He named economic growth and the maintenance of the influx of young people as his main goals for the next five years.

Papp had captured 61.84 percent of the vote with 97.08 percent of the votes counted.

Pál Veres, the newly elected opposition mayor of north-eastern Hungary’s Miskolc, on Sunday vowed to work together with “everyone who represents the interests of the city”.

“Miskolc has won,” Veres, who won 55 percent of the vote in Hungary’s fourth largest city, declared in his victory speech.

He said his campaign had been honest and committed to “working with all of Miskolc’s residents”.

“We want to build a new, beautiful city, to create a great Miskolc,” Veres said, adding that this would require the cooperation of all of the city’s residents.

Fidesz’ scandalous Borkai was re-elected as mayor of Győr. Candidates have garnered the following percentage of votes with 100 percent of the votes counted, the National Election Office reported:

  1. Zsolt Borkai (FIDESZ-CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATS) – 44.33 percent (19 312 votes)
  2. Tímea Glazer (DK-MOMENTUM-MSZP-JOBBIK-LMP) – 42.86 percent (18,671 votes)
  3. László Kovács (Civilians for Gyor) – 8.44 percent (3,677 votes)
  4. Jenő Balla (Unity for Gyor Assoc) – 4.37 percent (1,906 votes)

Local elections – Karácsony hails ‘historic victory’ in Budapest

karácsony winner

A historic victory has taken place in Budapest, Gergely Karácsony said after winning the Budapest municipal election on Sunday.

“This victory is about a green and free Budapest,” the joint opposition candidate for the capital’s mayor said.

Karácsony said October 14 would mark the start of a new era for Hungary in its quest to regain its freedom.

He said the victory was not his or the opposition parties’ but that of Budapesters who were fighting to win back the capital.

local elections winner
Photo: MTI/Balogh Zoltán

He noted that outgoing mayor István Tarlós had phoned to congratulate him, and Karácsony said he had thanked Tarlós for his work in office to date.

Karácsony pledged to put relations between the capital and the government on a new footing. He added that he would not be preparing for war but for even-handed cooperation with the Hungarian government.

Tarlós, who was greeted with a standing ovation at Fidesz’s election headquarters on the banks of the Danube, thanked the “entire community” of Budapesters who had voted for him, as well as the capital and its third district for the years he had served as their mayor.

“At a national level, the result is nice, but we need to pause to think about Budapest,” he said, commenting on the results of the election.

local elections end tarlós
Photo: MTI/Koszticsák Szilárd

“There’s nothing to say; this is how Budapest voted today,” Tarlós said. “The capital elected Gergely Karácsony and from midnight he’ll be Budapest’s mayor.”

“Thank you for the opportunity to be among you,” the outgoing mayor said, adding that he would “not forget” the 29-30 years he had spent as part of Budapest’s leadership.

“At 70 years of age, these things happen, but it’ll get better,” Tarlós concluded.

Results for Budapest mayor with 92.19 pc of votes counted

tarlós vs karácsony

Candidates for Budapest mayor have garnered the following percentage of votes with 92.19 percent of all votes counted, the National Election Office reported:

1. Gergely Karácsony (MOMENTUM-DK-MSZP-PARBESZED-LMP) – 50.62 percent (317,152 votes)

2. István Tarlós (FIDESZ-CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATS) – 44.29 percent (277,502 votes)

3. Róbert Puzsér (CITIZENS IN THE CENTRE) – 4.44 percent (27,794 votes)

4. Krisztian Berki (Independent) – 0.66 percent (4,119 votes)

Local elections – Budapest mayor: Voters to choose between ‘firm lead or chaos’

budapest mayor tarlós

Sunday’s mayoral election in Budapest will decide “whether the city stays in firm hands or falls into chaos”, incumbent mayor István Tarlós told his campaign-closing press conference on Saturday.

Tarlós pledged “peace and calm” to the city if he is reelected, rather than “fights” should his opponent Gergely Karácsony win the post.

Tarlós added that opposition candidate Karácsony had made “promises that cannot be met”.

Tarlós said that he himself had opposed the government “on a number of occasions” but insisted that “a realistic chance for cooperation must be retained” because “there is no government on earth that could cooperate with an instinctively adversarial, always threatening and hateful city management”.

“Five years for Budapest is at stake, rather than the wish dreams of a faltering man,” Tarlós insisted. He said that “there is no point” in refusing cooperation with the government because “that would bring no positive results for the city”.

On the other side, joint mayoral candidate Gergely Karácsony said on Saturday that “parties of the opposition will take Budapest back from those privileged who regard Budapest and public funds as if they owned them”, at a campaign closing event ahead of the municipal election, in the city’s eastern 15th district.

The ballot on Sunday will offer an opportunity “not only to elect new leaders but choose a different policy aimed at cooperation rather than division” he said.

The new leaders, he said, should “do small deeds serving the quiet majority rather than voicing high-sounding phrases”.

Karácsony voiced support for the district’s independent mayor and candidate for the next cycle, Angéla Németh, and urged that voters should elect local deputies from among her supporters.

Commenting on criticism by Karácsony, Tarlós said that “the City Hall has not seen a corruption scandal for the past nine years” and added that all public procurement contracts signed by the city were available on its website. Referring to Karácsony’s pledge that the municipality would not build sports stadiums until each district has a CT scanner, Tarlos said that making sports and health care appear as contradicting sectors equalled “not only hate-mongering but dilettantism, also”.

Concerning his achievements, Tarlós said that the city had completed 170 development projects including construction of the city’s fourth metro line and renovation of the third, construction of 400 kilometres of sewage pipes and 35 kilometres of cycling paths, renovation of 50 squares and extension of tramlines in western Budapest.

Touching upon his plans, Tarlós mentioned renovation of the Chain Bridge, adding an air-conditioning system to trains on the third metro line, renovation of two major squares in the city, as well as other developments.