Hungarian director dismissed, Ukrainian appointed to head Francis II Rákóczi High School of Mukachevo.Continue reading
The deprivation of rights of the Hungarian minority continues in Ukraine: the Francis II Rákóczi High School in Transcarpathia (formerly part of Hungary, now Ukraine) reports that two deputy principals have been dismissed.
The “siege” of the high school in Mukachevo (Munkács, Ukraine) continues, the institution wrote on its social network.
“They fired one of our deputy principals, they do not consult with the other one, they just instruct him, they bring in their ‘own’ deputy principal, they let outsiders look for mistakes in the school files, they make new timetables because they just want to take away hours from our teachers to give them to people from elsewhere,” the teachers wrote.
They also say that the new school administration has “completely turned its back on the teaching staff” and is “carrying out the ill will” of its principals “like a cancer at any cost.”
We are experiencing perhaps the most difficult time in the history of our school. We are hanging in there!
the statement concludes.
As Hungary Today reported in January, Ukrainian police removed Hungarian flags from several public institutions based on a decree, and the director of Francis II Rákóczi High School in Mukachevo (Munkács) was dismissed overnight without explanation. The city council has dismissed former school director István Schink two times already, completely unjustifiably.
The presidium of the Transcarpathian Hungarian Cultural Association has loudly protested the appointment of a principal by the Mukachevo city council, who has no ties to either the Hungarian community or the school.
The school published a new post on its Facebook page on Thursday. It says that the new principal has clearly stated what was previously only suspected.
At our union meeting, the appointed principal and her deputy stated that their short-term goal is to Ukrainianize the school, have Hungarian taught as a foreign language, establish a first Ukrainian class starting in September, and have some subjects taught in Ukrainian,”
the post reads.
Although the strong protests and the united stand of teachers made it possible that for the time being no Ukrainian-language class will be established and the language of instruction will remain in Hungarian, it is now clear:
The city administration wants to end Hungarian classes at our school as soon as possible,”
according to the teachers.
The new Ukrainian principal, Marija Pauk. Photo: Szemák Mihály Facebook
As Hungary Today has already reported, the Hungarian anthem, flag, and national colors were banned at the opening of the school year and the welcome speech of the principal was exclusively in Ukrainian.
Strangely enough, the use of their own national symbols was allowed in other school communities in Transcarpathia: for example, in Solotvyno (Aknaszlatina), where the Romanian-speaking or Hungarian-speaking high school was allowed to open the school year with the same traditions as before. It can be assumed that the Ukrainian authorities regard the Hungarian-language school in Mukachevo as a “pilot project” where they test how quickly and how far they can implement the Ukrainization of the school system in a multi-ethnic region.
Via Index.hu, Ungarn Heute; Featured image via Munkácsi II. Rákóczi Ferenc Középiskola