Losing trust – Hungarian prime minister crossing the Rubicon

Hungary celebrated the 163th anniversary of the revolution and war of independence in 1848 yesterday on March 15th. Under normal circumstances such a celebration would go down unnoticed internationally and would provide a day of pride and rejoice for the nation. However, the prime minister Mr Orbán had given a cause for frowning at with his celebration speech.

He claimed that Hungary had regained its posture last year by “saying good bye to IMF”. He brags about “saving pension system from stock exchange sharks” and he asserts “we stood up for the country…. when menial and untrue attacks were made on our country in the EU, and they were organised from Hungary” (Translation by me from the original speech in Hungarian, see below)

He went on stating that “we fought more than any other nation for our freedom and independence. We never tolerated being dictated from Vienna or Moscow. Even so, we won’t bear being dictated from Brussels or from anywhere else”

To top it up, he continued that “there were no one Hungarian involved in inventing national socialism and communism, so respect should be given to Hungarians, no briefing from anyone will be tolerated”

This is the point where Mr Orbán crossed the Rubicon. In European democracies bringing nazism and communism to a national responsibility level or even hinting at any current successors, i.e. current leading political parties of either Germany or Russia is fully out of comformance with the mainstream political thinking and behaviour. This is such a gross mistake that only Mr Berlusconi could make some years ago when comparing Mr Martin Schulz MEP to a “capo”. This is so much distorted thinking in Europe and in the European Union in 2011 that it clearly proves that our premiere does not understand, neither share many of the values and beliefs of the European community. Or at least communicating in such manner…

Why am I raising this here? My tolerance level is very high, I learnt this from my mother, at school and at the international student organisation I worked for years. I can tolerate many weird slips of tongues or well- grounded speeches even with tweaks of the truth. But there is a limit in my sense of democracy, and Mr Orbán just managed to cross this limit yesterday.

This is the worst moment for Hungary. We are struggling with the impacts of a rush-legislated unconventional and power-concentrating media regulation, we are facing repercussions of an EU-lead investigation into our “extraordinary taxes” sanctioning certain sectors and enterprises, we are exposed to export to Germany, the only major country that is recovering speedily from the economic recession. Moreover Hungary holds the rotating presidency of the European Union in the first half of 2011. Now imagine Mr Orbán standing up behind the “Strong Europe” placard with Ms Merkel behind…… Embarassing moment will that be for our country…..

It was just 2 weeks ago that German ambassador to Hungary Ms. Dorothee Janetzke-Wenzel stated that “trust is the basis of evertything, especially in the economy. Things work well only if the trust is there….”

Well, this trust now seems to be evaporating….

Really bad news for my country, Hungary….

Or to be constructive, it is a strong call for action…..

 

László Ráb, 16 March 2011

 

P.S.

For the record: the original Hungarian script of the quoted parts of the speech:

“Visszanyerjük ilyen összefogáskor (mint amilyen a tavalyi választás volt)  a tartásunkat. Kiálltunk az országért, amikor elbúcsúztunk a valutaalaptól, amikor árvízzel, vörösiszappal kellett küzdeni, amikor a tőzsdecápák kezéből a nyugdíjrendszert visszavettük, amikor az EU-ban alantas és hazug támadások érték hazánkat, amit itthonról szerveztek.

Minden nemzetnél többet harcoltunk, áldoztunk a szabadságért és függetlenségért. Nem tűrtük, hogy Bécsből, Moszkvából diktáljanak,. Most sem hagyjuk, hogy Brüsszelből vagy máshonnan diktáljanak.

56-ban a szocializmus nevében tiporták el a forradalmat. A nemzeti szocializmus és a kommunizmus feltalálói között egy magyar sem volt, hát meg kell adni a magyaroknak a kijáró tiszteletet, kioktatást nem tűrünk.“