they would go into opposition and refuse to form a coalition with any of the other parties. How about forming that national list first?
----
Their statement is similar to Jobbik, who also refuses from the beginning, even if no one even asked them, to join any coalition-Government
Being in Government, especially as a minor party is a discussable prospect. Look at SZDSZ, they are blamed by everyone for all the bad the Gyurcsany-Government did and the MSZP take the credit for the good parts
On the other hand if you are in to politics to make a difference, the more influence you can have is better and the Government is the most influential place to be in
-
For the list, it is possible to check
http://www.lehetmas.hu/jeloltek
for updates.
It looks close to 176 candidates (but I did not count them)

There is a big difference between governing and intending to govern, as opposed to just playing politics for the sake of publicity. I'm afraid that this is a group using the political arena to play for recognition; in other words, a debating society that wants it's people on the public payroll as MP's

If I am reading them right, then it's giving a lie to their party name, viz. that politics can be different. They are being opportunists like everyone else that came before them. What I haven't heard from these people is how they would address the hard issues that face the country. (They are going to have to do more than tell us all to recycle!) But then they may not have thought that far ahead; they may just be too busy playing politics.

to Farkas László:
Mistrust, fear, prejudice and hostile diversification are the crucial problems in Hungary.

The "the hard issues that face the country" are all of them originated from that evil, above.

Any Hungarian outside of the country could affirm me? :)

Zoltan GALANICS
LMP Coordinator of Sustainable Rural and Agripolicy
http://videk.blog.hu/2010/02/05/lmp_videkpolitikajanak_fo_vonalai

Information in English:
http://www.lehetmas.hu/news

Dear galazo,

In all my time on this website, I never once recall any official representative of a political party posting here on a discussion thread to answer any sort of critique. People blast the other parties here on a daily basis, but those parties never publicly respond to such criticism. I have to commend your approach, and I think other parties should consider it as well.

The negatives you mention I don't dispute. They sound like culturally ingrained tendencies at this point, and undoing their effect would take time and a rising economy. Perhaps I was being to cynical. If your goal is a serious effort to improve transparency and accountability, then it is a good one and I hope you find your electoral support.

Before I go, what is the LMP party position on the Mako gas development?

Thanks, galazo, for that info - I'll have to study your site for some time, nice that it is available in English.

I wish your movement a lot of successs - Hungary sure needs a Green party!

BTW: If you need help with translation into German, I would be willing to offer some help, like "proof-reading", as far as my time allows.

The majority of Hungarian politicians are not of the caliber that will enable Hungary to succeed.
The depth of the problems facing this country are enormous and the rise of the far right
may, in some way, underline this.
The MSZP and Fidesz have both had their chances and failed.
For more than one year educated and articulate contributors have posted their comments about
corrupt and inefficient politicians, bureaucrats,
and administrators etc.
My neighbour keeps reminding me that Hungary has been a free and democratic society for only
twenty years and it needs time to adjust to the
free market and capitalism.
Fair enough. But judging by the lack of progress that has been made it is going to take a hundred years by which time it will be “transparent” that folk might consider Communism the better option?
Mr Farkas
There is good and bad news about the Mako Gas Field.
There should be a very important announcement made about the middle of next month which should
be of interest to us all.
I have a ton of information but I will not post it on this site.

Dear Placebo

Thanks, I myself have often said around here that 20 years is not enough to overcome the developmental deficit caused by our past historical experience. If we look at other societies, we can see that post colonial Africa is still adrift, 50 years after independence. It's all a question of degree, degree of economic and politcal underdevelopment. The optimists around here feel we are only one or two elections away from a real turnaround. I say God bless them, I hope they are right. In my own heart, I'm not so sure.

Good news and bad news about Mako? I expected as much. How so? Having once worked in the oil industry, I can point out a few things. The large established majors in the business don't always appreciate a vast new source of supply, as it undercuts existing market price. They do like new discoveries, but only if they can totally influence the rate of extraction. The fact that the vast new source of supply is in Hungary, where extraction and utilisation may become a political issue introduces a wildcard into their plans. Expect lies and deceit where there is so much wealth at stake. Expect politicains to be bought off. Expect the nation to be shortchanged, and plan accordingly.

Mako is our one big chance to increase our wealth and solvency. Are we going to blow it, like Nigeria? Mako is a political issue. How will the extraction proceed? How will it be taxed? Whjat will the tax money be used for?

There is a discussion thread going on right now on the BBC website that Hungarians would likely find interesting and relevant:

"Should the EU bail out Greece?":

http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=7493&edition=2&ttl=20100210164925

The descriptions of Greece and it's problems sound hauntingly reminscent of those of Hungary. Some choice quotes from the discussion:

"As ex-pat living in Greece the problems are obvious. Avoiding tax and indeed any form of civil disobedience is elevated to an art form here. Only 35% of the adult population pay income tax, everyone else avoids it. Malpractice is rife in all layers of government, most appointments, contracts etc are accompanied by a plain brown envelope."

"It is sadly the Greek character not to pay up and to cheat maximum on taxes and the governments are run by families who steal constantly. They could even be headed for another dictator which might wake them up. NO we shouldnt help - they should help themselves from the top down. I adore Greece and the Greek people, but some things just are not correct."

There is talk of expelling Greece from the Eurozone and allowing it to sort out it's finances. There is fear that other countries, like Spain and Portugal might also be in need of a bailout. Many express concern that there are different degrees of economic productivity and corruption within the member zone, making it an unviable entity.

Comments?

For me, the main problem with LMP is that I just don't really understand what's so different about it. Is there *one* specific policy suggestion or issue that they have a "patent" on, i.e. that no other party shares with it? I find it hard to believe, because they are most routinely described as a "green" party, and basically every party in Hungary holds green positions, at least on paper. Also, their ads don't look much different than the others', and I can't help but wonder where all the money for them comes from. But again, what's the real difference here? Is there one *concrete* thing anyone can pin down?

@Erik: While I agree about the nebulous nature of their policies and image they are at least unique in terms of financing in that the LMP party opened their election campaign accounts for anyone to examine and invited other parties to do same http://bit.ly/b5lWBG
Copmare this to parties such as Jobbik who are claiming to be different whilst only declaring 10 million HUF since 2006 or was it 2004 - ridiculous. Particularly when it is estimated a respectable national campaign cannot be run for less that 700m (twice the 'legal' amount) as a bare minimum.

Dear Erik,

You would know better than me, but has any political party spoken up on these discussion boards before through an official spokesman? I was totally thrown for a loop upon hearing from "Zoltan GALANICS, LMP Coordinator of Sustainable Rural and Agripolicy" yesterday; it was so entirely unexpected! If he is really an LMP coordinator, then he might be extended an invitation to stick around and answer some of our questions.

While we're at it, it wouldn't hurt for the other parties to think about doing the same.

Farkas Laszlo@Notto dampen your hopes,but this is an insignificant site,plagued by trolls and 'HUNTERS'with still NO control by Erik,despite countless promises--Why would any serious political representative enter debate here? Besides we are too busy campaigning to real people face to face.
PS Would this LMP guy care to reveal WHO is the source of his funding? I doubt it very much,so no different politics here:)

Hi Ricsi, thanks for that, as I have long suspected as much myself. That's why I was a bit surprsed yesterday; sometimes the unexpected does happen!

You know there are little animals like the groundhog, who pop their heads out of a hole, sniff around quickly and pop back in? Some posters around here remind me of that; you hear from them once and that's it! I wondered if the LMP spokesman was like that, and so my suggestion that he stick around was half serious, half teasing. Come out! The water is fine!

Politics.hu is a good site. Those plebs that complain about it use it only to blow their own trumpet. That is to say they want to promote the political party that they support. More often than not this trumpet-blowing has a deafening
and dissonant effect on the ears of other contributors.
The LMP? Good luck. I don't know what is different about them either. The SZDSZ is about to disband so perhaps the ex-politicos could join the Greens and start sweeping our untidy streets?
PS. Mr Farkas. You are talking about Oil. I thought we were discussing Gas?

Dear Placebo,

Good observation. Oil and gas are linked as businesses, as one is often a substitute for the other based upon market price. The majors are involved in both. Exxon, which is commonly viewed as an oil giant, is also a primary partner in the Mako gas project. The Hungarian company MOL, which is another Mako principal, is a multinational comapny involved in the exploration and refining of both oil and gas.

The two products have other things in common. They both involve drilling, extraction, land use deals and depletion. (Sometimes they are found together). A glance at the market price charts for both crude oil and natural gas reveal close similiarities. They go up and down together, at pretty much the same times.

Experience with oil drilling often gives one a lot of insight into gas. Based on my oil industry experience, I would be concerned about the land use issues. On what terms was the land bought; who was paid; how much? Did any politicians get their hands into the deals? Were there any "sweetheart deal" givaways, like reduced taxes, share increase over time, depletion alowances. Do the principals have a right to "cap", with no questions asked? How will the revenue be taxed?

These are very very serious questions, as they involve billions of euros over the estimated life of the project! As production is due to start in 2012, Mako is in my opinion the number one political issue of the 2010 campaign! I'm trying to get people to see it.

@ Farkas Laci;

Do you know what kind of deal the locals, (land will be involved) got or possibly getting? Will they be getting X amount of $/ well up front, than X amount of $/ year for each producing well?

As well, do you or anybody for that matter, know what kind of development will be done in this area IE: gas plant etc?

Has an Environmental Impact Assessment been completed for this area as well as a Reclamation Plan be submitted for their exit strategy?

Last question, Did you ever get a response from the letter you sent to MOL?

Hi Zsuzsa,

The answers to all of your excellent questions is no. I am concerned about the lack of investigative reporting about this issue. Much of the official stuff can be questioned.

I am not at all impressed that a press officer from MOL did not respond to what I told her was a publicly worded question. Unfortunately this is all too typical in Hungary. They either don't respond or their response does not answer your concerns. There is so much mediocrity in the society; people not doing their jobs or not taking responsibility.

I didn't pursue it (yet), although I may contact another person within the organization. One reason I didn't really pursue the matter is due to the help I got from Pávaszem. He is good at digging up stuff and I asked him to look into the land use issues as well as the concerns about the gas being of a poor quality, something suggested by Falcon in Oct. What he found out was that the land was purchased and not leased (not good in my opinion), that the majors own over 300,000 acres outside of the Mako gas area adjacent to it. (That comes to almost half a million acres sacrificed to this cause!)

(cont)

(cont)

We were not able to determine if the parties who sold the land will be getting any production "points". In a Hungarian link Pávaszem found, the Falcon chief in Hungary disavowed the earlier expressed concerns about the poor potential quality of the gas, blaming a field production chief for mispeaking and being a loose cannon. The project is good to go for 2012, as expected.

I was suspicious of the earlier annoncment, as you well know, for the simple reason that there was no decline in MOL stock. Indeed, it has mostly gone up since I wrote the orginal piece about them. I still think MOL is a good financial investment.

In terms of information about what is going on, I say damn it, this is all a crooked card game, where you are at the table playing with a bunch of crooks! You can't believe what you're told, dealing from the bottom of the deck, six aces in a deck and lots and lots of chips on the table! We don't have the option of walking away in disgust either. That is a lot of Hungarian land, that contains a great deal of valuable gas.

The people deserve more disclosure. This is NOT to be treated as a private deal, nor a members only club. It's a public issue, and a very political one.

@Farkas László, and the other longtimers on this site.

Looks like Zoltan Galanics is certainly in LMP: http://lmpnograd.blog.hu/2010/02/06/az_lmp_balassagyarmati_jeloltje_galanics_zoltan

I'd say that's a first for any political representative in Hungary, actually coming onto this site and commenting. I, like you, am pleasantly surprised.

@ Farkas Laci;

Could you possibly find some answers to a couple more questions? I promise to stop asking anymore. Fine, so my fingers were crossed just a teensey weensey bit.

a) What will be done to mitigate the risks, IE: if a well blows? Are we dealing with Sour Gas or Sweet Gas?

b)The Oil and Gas companies, did they buy the Subsurface land, the Subsurface rights or did they do both? Same question for the adjacent land.

c) What does the Oil companies plane to put back into the local area, upgrade roads, jobs, new infrastructure, business opportunities for local contractors etc?

d) Similar question to yours, where are the profits going from the Gas if any?

e) This is a green question. What will be done to reclaim the land.

I promise that is it for now, I may have a couple more in future pending on the answers you provide.

Justasking/Mr Farkas.
There was an important meeting today and some information
may come available soon. . Another discussion will take place
the middle of next month
There is gas but it will be difficult to extract. There is a lot of water also!!!
One of the drillings was sealed in November because of this.
I hope to have more conversations with FL in the coming weeks.
Please hold your horses for the moment.. Thank you.
PS @justasking I do not know anything about the environmental
consequences and/or other implications. I have no personal involvement.
I just ask everybody to be a little circumspect until we can find out more details.

Galazo@ Is it not true that one of your Pécsi candidates(Kozármisleny?) is actually a lady called Bokos Sára who apparently was dismissed from the Reformatus Gimnazium in Pécs for 'misappropiation of funds'?
Politcs can be different? It seems not so ! :)

I would be very suprised if you have the courage to answer regarding this candidates eligibility.

Szebb jövőt

I would be very suprised if you have the courage to answer regarding this candidates eligibility.
Ricsi at February 11, 2010 8:45 PM
---
Do you have any links to impartial info on that case, or is it anecdotal information?
PiP at February 11, 2010 10:06 PM
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http://www.politics.hu/20100126/vona-reveals-jobbiks-enemies-list-imf-united-states-israel-slovakia-and-terrestrial-commercial-television-stations#c142