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Post by pieter on Aug 6, 2021 13:27:32 GMT -7
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Post by pieter on Aug 6, 2021 13:29:32 GMT -7
5 years ago
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Post by pieter on Aug 6, 2021 13:36:29 GMT -7
A furious Guy Verhofstadt lost his cool in the European Parliament over the EU's inability to punish Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban over the last three years.
The Belgian MEP blasted the EU Commission and the current EU presidency, held by Slovenia, over their failure to take punishing measures against Hungary.
Guy Maurice Marie Louise Verhofstadt (born 11 April 1953) is a Belgian politician who was the Leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe from 2009 to 2019, and has been a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Belgium since 2009. He was the Prime Minister of Belgium from 1999 to 2008 and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Budget from 1985 to 1992. He was a Member of the Chamber of Representatives from 1985 to 2009.
Since 2009, he has been a Member of the European Parliament, led the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Group (ALDE) from 2009 to 2019, and founded the inter-parliamentarian federalist Spinelli Group. He was the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party nominee for President of the European Commission in the 2014 European Parliament election. He served as the European Parliament's Brexit Coordinator and Chair of the Brexit Steering Group from 2016 to 2020.[3][4] He is an advocate for federalisation of the European Union.
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Post by Jaga on Aug 7, 2021 10:29:58 GMT -7
Pieter, thanks for the updates. It is sad what is going on in Hungary and it reminds me also what Poland is doing: limiting not pro-govermental mass media, setting up their own court system and judges, limiting LGBT rights. At least in Poland they don't limit universities yet. But we are asking for EU money like Hungary without introducing any real diversity
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Post by Jaga on Aug 8, 2021 19:47:06 GMT -7
Pieter,
here is Jaga one more time. I finally had some time to watch the video of Orban's interview with Tucker Carson. This interview was mentioned by many liberal media but it was better to watch it instead of learn what commentaries are saying. Orban speaks English well and he is eloquent. Polish Kaczynski is not really literate in English, too bad. Orban sounds intelligent and he represents a significant group of Hungarian society, probably the rural one. I don't agree with majority of his views, but Western Europeans need to understand that Hungarian approach to immigration might have some reasoning behind it - history of conflicts with Ottoman empire. Orban tried to be diplomatic about his approach to how Germany treated the immigrants. I think that EU has to understand also that "onze size does not fit all"
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Post by pieter on Aug 11, 2021 19:21:55 GMT -7
Jaga,
I understand you, but many West European centrist liberals, progressives, social democrats, Christian Democrats and Democrats don’t. Victor Orban’s Fidesz government party left the the European Christian-democratic, conservative and liberal-conservative European People's Party group after it established new rules allowing entire parties, not just individual MEPs, to be excluded from the parliamentary group,which it did on 18 March 2021.
As many as almost half of newly employed Hungarians had found work elsewhere in the EU since Hungary joined the EU. A public works program has been criticized by some economists for artificially and deceptively reducing unemployment numbers while engaging in and compensating people for possibly unneeded or unnecessarily inefficient work. Hungary has been highly dependent on EU funds during Fidesz's rule; these representing nearly 4% of the country's GDP, more than for any other EU member.
Fidesz was accused of antisemitism following their memorialisation of historic figures associated with Hungarian nationalism. These included Cécile Tormay, an enthusiastic supporter of Adolf Hitler.
The Fidesz government has been accused of "[chipping] away at the country's democratic framework, reducing judicial independence, taking control of most state and private media and reshaping the electoral system to favor [...] Fidesz." It has also been accused of providing a "blueprint for the erosion of democratic institutions" in countries like Poland, Italy, France, the Netherlands, and Brazil, while leaving analysts struggling to determine "whether Hungary is still a democracy".
The Fidesz government has been accused of "silencing media" and controlling all major media outlets in Hungary, thus creating an echo chamber that has excluded alternative political voices. The government has been accused of selectively starving non-loyal media organisations of government advertising revenues (the government is the country's second largest advertizer while pressuring the owners by targeting their other business interests so that the owners would either fall in line or sell their media holdings.
The Fidesz government has been accused of removing independent judges, stacking the Constitutional Court and judicial institutions with loyalists, and appointing as chief prosecutor a former party member who has seldom pursued corruption charges against Fidesz politicians.
The Fidesz government appointed former party politicians to non-partisan oversight institutions that were created as checks on government power after the fall of the Communist regime. The institutions involved included the State Audit Office, the State Prosecution Service, and the National Fiscal Council.
The Fidesz government has been accused of corruption and of fostering a "clique of loyal oligarchs". Hungary's corruption assessment has worsened significantly according to World Bank data despite a regional trend in the opposite direction. During the first 6 years of the Fidesz government, 5 of Orbán's closest associates were awarded ~5% of all public procurement contracts, totaling $2.5bn. The Fidesz government has been accused of diverting billions of euros of EU and federal funds toward loyal allies and relatives (with those who fell out of favour with the party also ceasing being granted the lucrative contracts). The EU anti-fraud agency has launched multiple investigation into misuse of EU funds by people close to PM Orbán, including a company owned by Orbán's son-in-law. The government has been accused of punishing non-loyal businesspeople with punitive taxes and regulation. A Hungarian economist described the government's economic shenanigans as "authoritarian capitalism" while some Hungarian and international experts have described post-2010 Hungary as a kleptocracy.
The European Court of Human Rights has rebuked the Hungarian government for failing to provide food to asylum seekers residing in Hungarian detention centres.
In September 2018, the European Parliament voted to suspend Hungary's voting rights within the EU, accusing it of breaching democratic norms and EU's core values. Poland vowed to veto the sanctions, however, immediately after the European Parliament voted to pursue the sanctions against Hungary. The move was the first step in a procedural process to sanction the Hungarian government that could result in the country losing its EU voting rights were it to be successfully completed, marking the first instance of the punitive process' use in the history of the EU.
After twelve member parties in the Centre right Christian Democratic EPP (European People’s Party) called for Hungary's Fidesz's expulsion or suspension, Fidesz's membership was suspended with a common agreement on 20 March 2019. The suspension was applied only to the EPP but not to its group in the Parliament. On 3 March 2021, Fidesz decided to leave the EPP group, after the group's new rules, however still kept their membership in the party. On 18 March 2021, Fidesz decided to leave the European People's Party.
Cheers, Pieter
Source: Wikipedia
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Post by Jaga on Aug 11, 2021 22:01:11 GMT -7
Pieter,
yes, I wish Fidesz and Orban was gone. I listened to him trying to understand his point of view, and where he comes from.
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