Our Goal is Self-Determination, Just Like in 1956

Hungarian is the language of freedom, said President Katalin Novák on Sunday in Australia, commemorating the 1956 Revolution and War of Independence in front of the Hungarian community of Melbourne.
Speaking at the ceremony at the Hungarian Center, she underlined: ‘Let us celebrate our Hungarianness, the love of freedom and the Hungarian nation’s unity across borders. We mourn those who gave their lives and blood for our freedom, we mourn the physical distance between us, the separation of families, the forced emigration – said Katalin Novák.
Katalin Novák stressed that

Hungarian is the language of freedom, adding that those who truly understand Hungarian in its essence will never submit to oppressive dictatorships.

Hungary has never been the cradle of dictatorships, authoritarian regimes have never been able to take deep root there.

She recalled the 1956 Summer Games in Melbourne, which “turned out to be the most dramatic rather than the most successful Hungarian Olympic performance of all time”. She said 1956 provided a moral foundation on which we can build our decisions of today.
This is why we have reunited the nation in a legal sense, and why we grant Hungarian citizenship and the right to vote to our fellow Hungarians living outside our borders, Katalin Novák pointed out, adding that we have sent a message to all directions that all Hungarians are equal, wherever they live in the world, because “a Hungarian is a Hungarian, period”.

The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 was a European revolution in every sense, in its values and spirit; young people raised the flag for freedom, justice and independence, for the ideals that are still the defining pillars of our European identity today,

said the Parliamentary and Strategic State Secretary of the Prime Minister’s Office on Sunday at the celebration of the Rákóczi Association on Bem Square in Budapest.

Hungarian students made history 67 years ago; they rebelled against the Soviet Union, the world’s most feared military power, and shook the Soviet empire, which they believed to be inviolable, and the idea of communism, which was spreading unstoppably and seeking to rule the world,” said Miklós Panyi in his speech after the traditional torchlight procession from the Technical University of Budapest to the site.

Thousands of young people from the Carpathian Basin gathered to commemorate the students who made world history, the State Secretary continued, adding that this large-scale commemoration is one of the most significant and spectacular national commemorative events of the past three decades.
Every generation has to fight for its own freedom, “today we are fighting for our freedom, and in doing so we are also fighting for Europe”, said the State Secretary. Today, he said,

a country that refuses to bow to the spirit of the age, which is against the nation, the family and Christianity, which refuses to bow to the pressure of modern-day migration, is branded an outsider”.

“While today we are still defending the Europe of free, Christian, independent nations, a large part of Europe wants to pass through Hungary under the spell of confused ideologies”, Miklós Panyi said. He said that “we have not changed, the foundations of our value system – homeland, nation, Christianity, family, freedom and independence – have not changed. Our values are European and solid, and we are not willing to throw them away, even in the face of ultimatums from Brussels’ bourgeois bureaucrats and their agents.”

The struggle of 1956 is our obligation: we will endure any bumpy road, take on any burden, face any opposing force, just to see the future of the Hungarian people safe and secure – stressed Csaba Dömötör, Parliamentary State Secretary of the Prime Minister’s Office, in his speech at the state ceremony held on Sunday at the Technical University of Budapest.
According to the politician, an era has now begun in which “we must once again fight for the right to an independent opinion, for political independence, and for the right to continue to hold the most important decisions about our future in our own hands”.
“If we keep the decisions about our future in our own hands just for the sake of it, Hungary’s best days are still ahead of us,” he underlined.

Referring to population movements, epidemics, war and economic hardship, he said “history has defiantly responded to the pomposity of the 21st century and has forced the door on us.” “There are no foreign tanks now – we do not have any – but there is pressure,” he explained, adding that the stakes are the same now as in 1956, its only that someone else is mocking us now.
“Our goal cannot be less than it was then: to make sure that others cannot decide for us. We will not dance as others whistle. We will only dance the Hungarian dance,” he said.

Featured Image: MTI/Máthé Zoltán