Liberal values must be reconsidered for the 21st century and environmental consciousness must be adopted as a basic requirement, outgoing chairman of Hungary’s liberal Free Democrats Gabor Fodor told daily Magyar Nemzet on Friday.
“Environmental consciousness must pervade every sector of politics not only one specialist area. The liberal answer to economic growth against environmental protection is that the freedom of enterprise is needed but that state also needs to secure the protection of community interests, including the protection of natural resources,” Fodor said.
In recent years, the liberals failed to behave either as a strong opposition party either as a strong government party, Fodor said. The majority of the party group would support government proposals even if it went against the party, he added.
Fodor said radical nationalist Jobbik had gained popularity because politicians failed to deal with the fact that there are a huge number of desperate people and many youngsters feel that they lost out in post-communist transformation. Jobbik’s success “must make us realise that we have left severe problems unhandled,” he added.
Finally a hungaruan politician who admits Jobbik’s rise is because the politicians in power weren’t doing their jobs right and not try to blame it on someone or something else.