István Hollik accuses EU politicians criticizing Hungary of hypocrisy in connection with the Qatargate scandal.Continue reading
Hungary’s government believes that the so-called Qatargate corruption scandal also proves that fundamental changes are needed in the European Parliament (EP). Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has already made a proposal.
Balázs Orbán, the Prime Minister’s political director, talked of hypocrisy when asked about the Qatargate scandal at last week’s EU summit.
The meeting included a hearing with Roberta Metsola, president of the European Parliament, regarding the corruption scandal in which one of the EP’s vice-presidents, Eva Kaili, has been arrested, and several other politicians, mainly socialists, may be involved.
While the European Parliament is lecturing the Member States, including Hungary, on the rule of law and talking about corruption in certain Member States, it turns out that the fish rots from the head down and that the parliament can quite obviously fall victim to financial and political lobbies,”
Balázs Orbán said. He called on the left-liberal-green majority of the parliament to “show a little restraint,” adding that a new era could begin in the history of the institution.
According to the politician, the Hungarian position is that the strengthening of the powers of the European Parliament in recent decades has not contributed to the deepening or creation of European democracy, but has only caused many more problems and sharpened tensions between Member States.
The functioning and powers of the EP should be reconsidered; it should be replaced by a parliamentary system of representatives from the national parliaments, as it was originally,”
he explained.
Balázs Orbán was referring to a resolution by the Hungarian parliament about the EU’s future. The resolution – initiated by the governing Fidesz/KDNP parties – was based on Prime Minister Orbán’s speech last year, in which he made contributions to the then-ongoing Congress of the Future of Europe. One of his suggestions was to fundamentally reform the European Parliament: “We must significantly increase the role of national parliaments: nations’ legislatures should send representatives to the European Parliament based on the model of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.”
Featured photo via the European Parliament