The Action for Democracy considers Hungary a battleground state, alongside Italy, Brazil, Poland, and Turkey.Continue reading
The governing parties will ask the national security committee of the parliament to review the “issue of foreign funding of left-wing parties.” Reportedly, the US foundation in question, Action for Democracy, is now financially involved in the Italian elections too.
“In the past 30 years, there has been no example of what the left’s candidate for prime minister has done,” Fidesz group leader Máté Kocsis said after the group meeting of the governing Fidesz-KDNP parties on Thursday, M1 reported.
“In fact, Péter Márki-Zay admitted in public that his campaign had received billions of forints in foreign funding,” Kocsis pointed out, adding that this is prohibited by law.
“We will take the initiative to have the national security committee review this case, to see exactly what happened. We will involve the state secret services that have to deal with this. First of all, let us listen to them. We need to gather all the information, because clarity will be essential in this case,” the Fidesz group leader said.
Last month, Péter Márki-Zay, the mayor of Hódmezővásárhely (southeast Hungary), and former prime ministerial candidate of the joint opposition coalition in the parliamentary elections, made some remarks about his campaign funding and US connections, raising eyebrows in the Hungarian media and public discourse. He claimed that as recently as July of this year, two months after the elections, his campaign received several million HUF “from America.” Technically, Márki Zay’s Everybody’s Hungary Movement (MMM – Mindenki Magyarországa Mozgalom) is a movement, not a party.
Márki-Zay said that the donations came from Action for Democracy, which was created in February 2022, just before the Hungarian elections. In a statement, Action for Democracy rejected “any accusations of foreign interference in (the Hungarian) elections.”
On Thursday, Hungary Today reported that since a landslide center-right victory is imminent in the Italian elections this Sunday, Action for Democracy has moved its focus to Italy.
Featured photo via MTI/Bodnár Boglárka
