Viktor Orban claims that the problems of the Hungarian economy result from the fact that the European Union financially supports Ukraine. The Hungarian Prime Minister also announced attempts to torpedo the EU ban on energy imports from Russia.
During his weekly interview with Hungarian public radio, Viktor Orban argued that the war in Ukraine has already cost his country over 20 billion euros. “If we had this money, our economy would be thriving. Meanwhile, nothing is thriving,” the Hungarian prime minister said.
The politician ignored the fact that a significant part of this amount is money that Brussels has blocked due to Hungary's problems with the rule of law. Instead, he suggested that his country's difficult situation is due to the fact that the European Union is supporting Ukraine, which has been attacked by Russia, at the expense of its member states.
In addition, Orban announced that he would do everything to torpedo the EU import ban that the European Commission wants to propose next month. This concerns legal solutions that will lead to an end to gas imports from Russia by 2027. This is opposed by Slovakia and Hungary, which still import Russian energy carriers.
“We must prevent this by all possible means. There is no point in having a pipeline if it cannot be used to import gas,” Orban said, referring to the TurkStream gas pipeline, through which Russia continues to supply fuel to Hungary, among others. Orban also assured that if the EU authorities compensate his country for the costs of the ban on Russian gas imports, Budapest is open to talks on this matter.
Poll: Opposition maintains lead over Orban's party: 43 to 24 percent
Since October, the opposition TISZA has been ahead of Viktor Orban's party in the polls. Currently, Peter Magyar's party is supported by 43 percent of voters. As many as 60 percent of respondents want the ruling Fidesz to lose next year's parliamentary elections.
According to a study published on Friday by the Publicus Institute, commissioned by the portal nepszava.hu, if parliamentary elections were held in Hungary this week, the opposition party TISZA would win, with 43 percent of the vote. The Fidesz party, which has been in power since 2010, can currently count on the support of only 24 percent of respondents. A large group of people are still undecided – as much as 32 percent. The survey shows that in addition to TISZA and Fidesz, only two more parties would be in parliament. These are the Democratic Coalition (9 percent) and the Our Homeland Movement (5 percent). The remaining parties would not exceed the 5 percent electoral threshold.
As many as 60% of respondents would be happy if Viktor Orban's party lost in next year's parliamentary elections. Only 28% of survey participants would like his cabinet to remain in power for another term.
Assessing the situation in the country, as many as 54% of respondents stated that they were not satisfied with the current course of events. 29% of respondents were satisfied, with only 10% being completely satisfied with the current situation in their homeland. 85% of respondents announced their willingness to participate in the elections.
In a report accompanying the survey results, analysts from the Publicus Institute point out that the results show that Fidesz has failed to improve public sentiment over the past two months. The sentiment has remained almost unchanged since the previous survey, conducted in March. The same applies to the scale of support for individual parties, which has remained stable for many weeks, constantly ensuring an advantage for the opposition party TISZA.
Tomasz Dawid Jędruchów (PAP)
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