Hungarian PM Viktor Orban. Flickr/EPP. Some rights reserved.
“Hungary’s Mussolini Vows to Make the EU Member an Illiberal State”, titles Newsweek. Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban has finally come in the open. At
a recent rally of party supporters he has admitted that he is out to turn the country into an illiberal state. He pointed
out that liberal western democracies cannot remain globally competitive, and
that China, Russia, and Turkey should be taken as the example to follow.
These worrying statements are, unfortunately, backed up by facts. They follow years of
increasingly restrictive laws in Hungary, which have endangered the
independence of the judiciary, the media, and civil society, and entrenched the
power of the ruling party, Fidesz.
In April 2011 a
constitutional reform silenced the constitutional court, allowing the government to pass any legislation it
sees fit. In the same year a draconian media reform placed public and private media under state tutelage,
eventually leading to widespread manipulation in public broadcasting, direct censorship and closure of opposition media, and attempts to bankrupt international TV channel RLT for its criticism of the
regime. As a result fear has returned to Hungarian society. Relatives
and friends of opposition figures became
unemployable, a number of NGOs receiving foreign aid were blacklisted, and
international donors such as the Norwegian Civil Fund threatened with
suspension of their operating license.
International institutions have been
increasingly vocal. The Council of Europe has written to the Hungarian Prime
Minister to share its concern over the NGO audit. And the OSCE, after having already attacked the new media law, demonstrated in a
recently published report that media coverage shows “significant bias” towards
the ruling party.
Neelie Kroes, the vice-president of
the European Commission, spoke out against the attempts to bankrupt
anti-government media: “RTL is one of the few channels in Hungary not simply
promoting a pro-Fidesz line; it is hard to see that the goal is anything other
than to drive them out of Hungary”. She sees “a pattern contrary to the EU's values” that
risks leading “to a different, darker period in Hungary's history.”
Concrete
action must follow these words. The EU has the tools
to act and demonstrate that a suspension of democracy will not be tolerated.
Article 7 of the Treaty of the European Union establishes
a prevention mechanism in
the event of a risk of a breach of common values of the Union by a Member
State, and a penalty mechanism in
the event of an actual breach. Penalties include suspension of voting rights in
the European Council, freezing of structural funds to the country, and if worse
comes to worst expulsion from the Union.
The Article 7 procedure should be activated now. With Hungary heavily dependent on EU structural funds with 97% of investment
project requiring EU support, the mere threat of suspension would send a
strong message to Viktor Orban. It would show the Hungarian citizens, frightened
by the authoritarian regime, that they will not be left alone. And it would
send a message to Europe's neighbours - be it Turkey’s Erdogan or the government
of Azerbaijan - that the bloc is not willing to tolerate an erosion of
democratic standards.
To avoid that a situation such as
Hungary’s develops again, Europe must also act to put in place greater
protection of fundamental rights. This includes protecting the freedom and
pluralism of Europe’s media. Nearly 200,000 people have already signed a European Citizens Initiative demanding an EU Directive to protect the independence
of the press across the continent. This demand should be taken up by the
European Commission, and a draft legislation should be produced immediately.
Europe is the cradle
of democracy. It is now up to the European institutions to demonstrate that
this continent will stand up and do what it takes to defend it.
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