In the News
This article was written by the editors and appeared in Brussels Signal. Orbán denounces ‘neo-communist tactics’ as Fidesz rallies behind detained ministers.
Featuring Hermann Tertsch, Distinguished Fellow, Gold Institute for International Strategy
Viktor Orbán has accused Hungary’s governing Tisza party of “neo-communist tactics” after prosecutors detained two ministers from his governments on September 28.
The former prime minister said the new authorities were producing fresh victims every day and would not break what he called his patriotic community. He argued that Tisza had staged political theatre rather than face rising taxes and fuel prices.
Balázs Hankó and Miklós Seszták were taken into custody hours after parliament voted 139-0 to suspend their immunity. Fidesz and its Christian Democrat allies boycotted the sitting.
Hankó is being investigated over the National Cultural Fund, where prosecutors say 17.3 billion forints (about €44 million) went to awards outside the fund’s statutory purposes. Seszták is accused of taking bribes worth some 11 billion forints (about €30 million) tied to bus procurement and construction contracts.
Balázs Orbán, political director to the former prime minister, described the events as a political prosecution in the style of the 1950s. He said the method had been copied from Poland, where he claimed the government had already used similar means against its opponents.
Kinga Gál, a Fidesz vice-president and MEP, called September 28 “a dark day for Hungarian democracy”. She accused Prime Minister Péter Magyar of pressuring police and prosecutors while building a political police force to pursue his opponents.
András László, also a Fidesz MEP, said the judiciary was acting on Magyar’s personal instructions. He said the Prime Minister had announced the proceedings on social media before the authorities opened them.
László tied the detentions to a second vote at the same sitting, in which no MP backed President András Baka’s nominee for prosecutor general. The service pursuing the two men has had no confirmed head since its last chief resigned under pressure from Magyar in July.
János Bóka, the Fidesz parliamentary leader, said his group would not assist political theatre and stayed away from the vote. He said those who set the case in motion would be called to account.
Outside Hungary, Vox MEP Hermann Tertsch declared his solidarity with Hungary and described the proceedings as part of a globalist offensive led by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Fidesz and Vox sit together in the Patriots for Europe group in the European Parliament.
Magyar’s own immunity was lifted the same morning at his request, over a 2024 incident in which prosecutors say he threw a man’s phone into the Danube. The European Commission, which froze billions of euros over rule-of-law concerns during Orbán’s final term, moved to unblock the money after the change of government.
Both former ministers deny wrongdoing and none of the three has been charged.
Read the full article at Brussels Signal
Hermann Tertsch is a Distinguished Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington, D.C. foreign policy and defense think tank.
