A head of state, who can rule for an indefinite time, issue new laws without the parliament, and imprison journalists, if they write things which you don’t agree with.
It sounds like a dictatorship in a third world country. But the fact is that here a country in the midst of the EU.
With brand new powers, voted through the european parliament Monday 30. march, it is the above reality in Viktor Orbán’s Hungary.
And it is indeed Orbán’s Hungary.
The 56-year-old chairman of the Fidesz party and prime minister in the eastern european country got Monday powers, that has caused many critics to cry dictator after the man, who has been at the forefront of Hungary since 2010.
Quite as far as professor at the University of Copenhagen Marlene Wind don’t go.
But she is appalled by the latest development, albeit not surprised.
“I have followed the developments in Hungary in the last five-six years, and I’m not surprised that Orbán has now gained more power. There is now talk about a kind of sham democracy, as one sees in Russia,” says Marlene Wind, who prefer to call Viktor Orbán’s Hungary an autocracy.
“As I see it, it is not a dictatorship. You don’t throw people in jail, but intimidates instead, the media and opponents. Orbán is far smarter than a typical dictator,” she says and elaborates:
“He is the collector and inserts its friends in the media, he changes the valgstrukturen in the country, so it is impossible for the opposition to win, he changes the constitution, he fires the judges and inserts its own.”
for a long time have been aware of the fact that Viktor Orbán and his party, Fidesz, have ruled Hungary in a less and less democratic direction.
But in spite of numerous warnings to get back on, the suspension from the liberalkonservative group in the european Parliament the EPP and the threats to trigger the so-called nuclear bomb of the EU treaty, where a country can be deprived of the right to vote, or eventually completely thrown out, then continues Orbán its anti-democratic process.
Monday’s vote in the Hungarian parliament is just the latest step.
the Vote was effectively for a bail out in connection with the coronakrise, which also hit Hungary.
And Hungary’s opposition parties supported the majority of the nødlove, which was voted through, with the exception of two parts.
Nødlovene in Hungary, not like in other EU-countries an end date. Orbán, together with its majority in parliament even extend them indefinitely.
And so it is with nødlovene made public to write false on the coronavirus outbreak. The government acts as referee.
Nevertheless, there was nødloven voted through with 137 for and 53 against.
the Opposition in the country is not surprisingly disappointed:
“the Question is: Is it here to give Viktor Orbán, the possibility to govern by decree for the rest of his life? In that case, is it what you call a kingdom,” said Péter Jakab, president of the nationalist opposition party Jobbik.
At The Conservatives here in Denmark, who are in the same EU group as Fidesz, have you received the latest development from Hungary with suspicion.
Now you want to work on to be able to throw the Fidesz and Orbán out of the EPP, where Manfred Weber and Donald Tusk is the leading figures, as well as look at whether the country can be penalized financially.
“We have a member of the EPP, which has come a very long way away from ‘the rule of law’ and almost protrude dictatorship-like actions to themselves. And that is why we at Conservative reached a point where it is enough. This question should be addressed in the EPP. To respond now,” says member of the european Parliament for the Conservative Pernille Weiss.
She has written for just Weber and Tusk in order to get them to respond to Hungary’s undemocratic behavior.
“the Cup has long been to be filled in relation to Orbán and Hungary. The action, which was adopted this Monday, was the straw that got it to boil over. Orbán can now rule by decree indefinitely. And it is not what we stand for in the EPP or the EU,” she says.
Marlene Wind trades case is about more than just Hungary. It is about the Eu’s future.
“The internal market in the EU is threatened. The same is the credibility of the action. The company will settle down in a country, where officials and judges are in the pocket of the government? And how should the EU be able to go after Putin and Erdogan, when you yourself have a country do as they do?” asks Marlene Wind.
“It is deeply problematic, and the EU is a joke, if you do not protect democracy,” she says.
