Of all the words regularly thrown at Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány by his opponents, one of the rare positive adjectives is that he is clever. Today’s announcement that he’ll resign as prime minister if the Socialist Party can find a successor in two weeks’ time is just one more example. The question of course, is why offer to resign now?
By stepping down from his post in two weeks, Gyurcsány can to some extent wash his hands of the impending electoral crushing the Socialists will receive in June’s European Parliamentary elections. He can always claim in the future that the direction the government took after his resignation was what made the defeat as one-sided as it likely will be, and that the Socialist Party would have performed better had he remained prime minister.
But looking beyond the European Parliamentary elections, Hungary is the economic sick man of the European Union, with the economy likely to deteriorate further unless harsh austerity measures are enacted. With either outcome, Gyurcsány’s already historic low approval ratings would fall even further. There is no way he could improve his image with the Hungarian population as things stand now short of donating his own considerable personal wealth to the nation.
Furthermore, it’s not as if Gyurcsány will be disappearing from public life. Although offering to resign as prime minister (which, one must remember, may not happen after all), Gyurcsány will remain chairman of the Socialist Party, and will no doubt exercise his influence on whoever succeeds him as prime minister. One only needs to look to Russia where although Dmitry Medvedev is the president on paper, Vladimir Putin is still widely considered to be running the show.
Essentially, today’s announcement is an admission by the prime minister that he is incapable of increasing his popularity given the current status quo, and rests on the assumption of four possible outcomes:
- a new Socialist prime minister will take the fall for Gyurcsány if and when the nation’s fortunes slide further
- a caretaker “government of experts” will do the dirty work he was unwilling or unable to do and improve the country’s economic standing while earning the population’s wrath
- the opposition will come to power and enact necessary austerity measures that will ruin their current popularity
- the opposition will come to power and leave the country in worse shape than they inherited it
Assuming that he actually does resign this time – since people are quick to forget – any of these four realistic scenarios would allow Gyurcsány to step back into the spotlight and offer his services to the nation once again sometime in the near future. Prime Minister Gyurcsány is hardly saying farewell, he’s saying viszontlátásra, or “until we meet again!”
He’s kinda Hungary’s answer to David Brent. Poor Gyurcsány just wants to be loved.
Wouldn’t that be great if this whole mess were just one big BBC satirical comedy after all.
Oh how we would laugh !
This is the right choice and the inevitable outcome if Hungary wants to progress:
” a caretaker ‘government of experts’ will do the dirty work he (GF) was unwilling or unable to do and improve the country’s economic standing while earning the population’s wrath..”
Israelis wants to invest ‘bigtime’ in Hungary.
Rather them, than the Russian ‘mafia’.
Put your money where your mouth is, Israel. But, please, no anti-semitism lectures or constraints on freedom of speech.
Hungarians are a very tolerant race. This is why we are in such a mess.
I always find analyses like the following to be plainly stupid:
“Hungary is the economic sick man of the European Union, with the
economy likely to deteriorate further unless harsh austerity
measures are enacted.”
Mr Csipke – unless you get it that people like you need to pay all
your taxes, stop cheating, Hungary will remain a corrupt place.
Introduce a flat tax, abolish the Bt and Kft statutes and make ALL
employed Hungarians pay income tax and not cheating through
AFA szamlak!
Austerity measures are no more a panacea than a flat tax, despite what proponents of the latter claim. Of course getting more Hungarians to properly pay their taxes is fundamentally important, but it’s unlikely to happen when they have such a high bracket and APEH (the tax office) rarely catches them. A Hungary where most Hungarians pay their full taxes would undoubtedly be in better economic shape, which could happen if taxes were lowered and APEH beefed up, thereby giving them more incentive to pay (not to mention that for some people, the high taxes make their wages unlivable). There’s no simple solution, however, and the austerity measures would only be a temporary fix, but without them, the situation will only deteriorate further.
Actually Zoltan, the solution you mention I believe is correct and most of all IS simple.
Step 1: Slash taxes so that people can afford to pay them. Actually, keep them the same but raise the thresholds to something sensible e.g. 38% bracket over 10M HUF.
Step 2: Re-assign the useless bureaucrats to Apeh and get them to inforce tax collection.
More than 30% of GDP is lost in the black market. Recovering even a fraction of this would be a massive help.
Cutting taxes stimulates the economy, both from the individual and business perspective.
Its not hard, its just different.
More importantly, it doesn’t mean we have to cut benefits or even public spending. That is a secondary measure and perhaps not necessary. Economic recovery does not have to mean that people go hungry. The key to economic recovery is economic stimulous, why otherwise, would the US and other western European governments be pumping trillions of dollars/pounds/Euros into their economies. It is not just to fill black holes of debt.
OK, so watch this thread and see how many Hungarians say I don’t know what I’m talking about, you can’t do it like that, Hungary is different, the other countries control our economy, yada yada yada. Oh my bleeding heart!
To them I say:
If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got.
Hello JD,
I am one Hungarian to whom you are making sense with the above post! Why have a tax system if you are not going to enforce it? It’s nothing but sheer sloppiness. Of course, for the public to have confidence in the whole process, there has to be accountability. That is another important issue to work on.
When we told the Russians to “go home” in 1989, little did we know that we would just be stuck with ourselves and our own inexperience. Very similiar to Africans telling the colonial powers to get out; how have they fared? We have almost no historical experience with self rule. Things like law enforcement and accountability are very difficult subjects for us; we have to live and learn a lot.
JD. As far as I am concerned what you have written about tax issues makes sense. And I agree with you.
Simple solutions to difficult problems!
That Gyurcsány should resign before the EP election 2009 we already decided late Autumn 2006, after the bad Local Elections he did in October. Just go back and read the old editions.
The only surprise is why he did it so late, could have been the Financial breakdown actually. Otherwise it would have happened around Christmas 2008.
Hava Nagila, you said some time ago: ‘Israelis wants to invest bigtime in Hungary. Rather them, than the Russian mafia.’ Err … are they not the same lot?
Sorry Sophie you probably need to check a map. Israel and Russia are some way away from each other.
But the country’s names have some of the same letters in them so I can see why you might get confused.
The mafia today is run by Russian jews.
The American people have been led to believe that the
crime syndicate in America is strictly an
Italian affair. Our Jewized entertainment media has produced
countless films and TV shows
depicting Italo-Americans as the masters of the syndicate.
But a closer look reveals that Jews, not
Italians, founded and financed the syndicate in the early
days before prohibition.
In the days before prohibition the underworld consisted
mainly of ethnic street gangs and “social
clubs.” These gangs were mostly confined to certain
neighborhoods in the large cities, and their
activities were anything from hired terrorism to small-time
gambling and prostitution. But before
prohibition there was no national crime syndicate and hardly
any organization at all in the
underworld.
The man most responsible for the formation of the crime
syndicate on the East Coast was the
Jewish gambler and financier Arnold Rothstein. Rothstein
“fixed” the 1919 World Series by bribing
key members of the Chicago White Sox to “throw” games. He
also financed the organized illegal
importation of liquor from Europe and Canada when
prohibition came on the scene in 1920.
The same cancer that bankrupted the Soviet Union and the early Russian Federation, namely the Russian-Israeli Mafia — the global organized crime syndicate that uses Israeli government protection and passports to cover their illegal worldwide activities — has so thoroughly permeated the American political and business system that the FBI and U.S. intelligence agencies are virtually powerless to bring the major perpetrators to justice.
Across the United States, FBI agents have been hamstrung by the Justice and Homeland Security Departments, led by two individuals, Michael Mukasey and Michael Chertoff, whose close links to the Russian-Israeli Mafia in New York and New Jersey have seen case after case involving Russian-Israeli mobsters going un-investigated and virtually ignored.
The EU being part of the Euro-Atlantic alliance is a sinking ship and I doubt Serbia will board it before it goes under. We will send some life boats to our Romanian friends so we can all enjoy a prosperous future out of the EU.
There is no future in a German controlled EU, which resembles more of a dictatorship than an open trading region. I have my doubts the UK will want to remain on board once the ship sinks also.
NATO is now the organisation of the unwilling and the EU was once a good idea but has since mutated into a nightmare. I am so glad there are many obstacles in the way of Serbian membership.
Love you all!!
Dear Mr Siegel, how is it with your Russian friends nowadays?
The official opinion, as stated by representatives from the Russian Embassy in Stockholm in Sweden middle of March this year, is that:
- there is no Mafia in Russia today
- there is no corruption in Russia today.
All due to the loving care of the Jobbik-hero Mr Put in. That is why they think that all people that does not agree with them should be Put in to a mental asylum.
No one feels the vibes from the ‘Good Old Communist Time’, that too many Hungarians miss?
What we need here is another Russo-Swedish War, this time with no survivors on either side.
@VIK
Mr Putin, has cleverly outwitted the Russian Jewish Mafia, by exiling or imprisoning the oligarchs. No doubt there is still some activity there but Putin has nipped the main players in the butt also taken power away from them.
I don’t get your sarcasm and if I assume what your saying then you are a disgrace to the Hungarian people, if you are so against Hungarians then leave the country instead of dividing and causing animosity against them, you are a traitor if this is your position.
No, Godot: too drastic. The Swedes and Russians are good guys these days. Instead, why not propose to the Swedes that they enact a law that makes zionist trolls posing as Swedes punishable by impalement … on anything suitably pointed?
Wow, Busgy Siegel! You know your stuff! Thanks for sharing it.
Dear Mr. Siegel, I think you misunderstood me. I was not talking about the “Russian Jewish Mafia”, I was asking about the “Russian Mafia”. So you agree with the official Russian version then?
Or are you just another of these Jobbik/MIEP-aliases that loves The Russian Bear in the form of Mr Put in? Who cannot wait until his forces occupies the Ukraine (1 year left of the lease of Crimea). Who is then a traitor, not just to Hungary, but to the Hungarian ethnic kin in the Ukraine?
You are obvious for suppressing Free Speech and love the “Western Liberals” in the EBU who banned the Georgian contribution to the ESC in Moscow yesterday. For the few who still are for Free Speech, here is the link that all these Jobbik/MIEP-aliases do not want to see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lBAR_GFhb44
Stephane & 3G We Don’t Wanna Put In Official Video Clip Georgia ESC 2009.
It would have had a hard time to compete with the Swedish intermission piece that made the Russian Embassy to issue a statement where they said that those persons behind it should be locked up.
Real freedom of expression can obviously then be found at:
http://svt.se/embededflash/1504165/play.swf
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