A deputy state secretary at Hungary’s Ministry of Rural and Settlement Development has resigned after only around two months in the position, citing personal reasons. The announcement immediately triggered a political exchange, with Fidesz MP Miklós Panyi suggesting the departure points to problems within the new Tisza government.
Rural and Settlement Development Minister Dr Viktória Lőrincz announced the resignation on Sunday afternoon, stressing that there was nothing extraordinary about the decision.
Deputy state secretary cites personal reasons
According to Lőrincz, the deputy state secretary submitted their resignation because of a change in their personal circumstances.
“There is nothing extraordinary about this; we will soon arrange for the departing colleague to be replaced,”
the minister said in a Facebook post.
Lőrincz also rejected speculation that internal disagreements at the ministry were behind the resignation. She accused Fidesz of attempting to build conspiracy theories around the departure and said the ministry would not comment on what she described as baseless claims, out of respect for its employees’ private lives.
She also called on opposition politicians not to spread what she described as false information about people working in public administration.
Fidesz MP claims leaders are already leaving
The minister’s comments came shortly after Fidesz MP Miklós Panyi published his own post about the resignation.
Panyi claimed that the official had started working at the ministry at the end of June and that their departure would take effect on 1 September. He described the ministry as one of the “most incompetent” departments of the Tisza government and suggested that the resignation reflected wider problems within the new administration.
The Fidesz politician also claimed that several government officials, including chiefs of staff and deputy state secretaries, had left their positions after only a few weeks. Panyi characterised the latest departure as a sign that officials were already “fleeing” what he called the “Tisza government’s authoritarian government”.
He also questioned why a supposedly committed and competent senior official would leave a well-paid position so soon after taking it up.
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Minister rejects claims of a crisis
Lőrincz, however, said the resignation should not be interpreted as evidence of a crisis within the ministry. She maintained that the official’s decision was based on personal circumstances and reiterated that a replacement would be appointed shortly.
The departure comes roughly two months after the official joined the ministry. The resignation is expected to take effect on 1 September. At this stage, neither the identity of the departing deputy state secretary nor further details about the personal reasons cited for the resignation have been publicly disclosed.
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If you listen to the weekly debates in The Hungarian Parliament, the head of the Hungarian Nationalists, Toroczkai László, and Prime Minister Magyar essentially pistol whip each other. The nub of Toroczkai’s point of view? : Magyar and Tisza are not only incompetent spoon-fed spoiled brats, they do not care about rural people. Given that László has seen a minor bump in the polls, I have to assume this is from rural voters who are disenchanted by Magyar’s first 4 months. So, changing this developing dynamic has to be in the prime minister’s mind. In my view, this has something to do with this positional change.
You sound like a bit of loser from the Fidesz…
It’s wild that someone leaving a sub-ministerial post in public administration is even newsworthy. People leave jobs all the time, yes, even those they recently started. I’ve done it and I’m sure that 50% of people in the workforce have done it too. They might have been headhunted and made an offer they cannot refuse. There might be a personality clash with their line manager and rather than get sick from stress they decide it’s best to quit and find another job. They might have received bad news about their health and don’t want to publicly comment on it. Their partner might have received a terminal diagnosis and they decide their palliative care is more important. In short, there’s a million and one reasons why people leave jobs. A job’s a job, unless you leave under a cloud you can usually find another one without much bother.
I always fear that it is health related. In any case yes you can try to make something out of it but you need more than just the resignation if you want to do that. That’s where Fidesz has failed. You need an incident, something, and there is nothing there. In this case you have to take the person’s word for it and if something was really was bad within the government people wouldn’t resign in just two months. If you had one or two more within that specific ministry then you could get on your high chair and make accusations.
Slipped up. The expression is “high horse” rather than high chair.
In this case, I think high chair fits quite nicely 😁