The disappointed are growing, while multinationals celebrate: Hungary is heading back to the pre-2010 world

The circle of disappointed voters is growing, while foreign multinationals are already lighting celebratory bonfires, this article argues. Hungary, it says, is once again beginning to restrain domestic competitors, reviving a pattern associated with the period before 2010.

The piece points to 1,236 promises made before the election. The family allowance was supposed to double, but did not. Nor did value-added tax on vegetables, fruit and healthy staple foods fall to 5%. Measures that were introduced, including a VAT reduction on medicines and a school-start allowance, also failed to match expectations, the article says.

The government has explained the failures by saying it expected to inherit better budget conditions. The article dismisses this as “Facebook government” combined with blame-shifting, arguing that making promises and criticizing from the sidelines are easy.

Its sharpest criticism concerns Hungarian businesses. A planned asset-recovery office could accuse any company that previously won a state contract of having served the National Cooperation System, or NER, during Viktor Orbán’s 16 years in government. The article says several companies are already being pushed out: one faces the threat of an inspection, while another has been excluded from a specific tender.

The consequences for investment, suppliers, jobs and the broader strengthening of the economy, it says, are being ignored. Foreign multinationals can therefore welcome the renewed weakening of domestic rivals. The article warns that readers who do not remember the pre-2010 years, including first-time voters, will soon see what that period was like. It ends by suggesting that the enthusiasm of “Auntie Burning Torch” may not be the only thing to disappear.

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Facebook government