Mr Orbán said he would like Tisza supporters – as there were many young people among them – to also listen to what he had to say, namely that, in actual fact, there is money behind the Ukrainian-Hungarian conflict. Ukraine has no money, today, the Europeans are giving them money, but their money has run out as well. Therefore, their plan is that the European Union will take out a loan from bankers and will give the money to Ukraine in the form of credit. According to the contract, the Ukrainians will only have to repay this loan if they have defeated the Russians and they have paid them reparations. No banker in their right mind would provide a loan for that, he observed, adding: unless the Member States secure the loan taken out by the Union. As the money will never be recovered from Ukraine, the nation states will have to repay the loan in its place.
“If we agree to this, if we elect a pro-Ukraine government, our children, but even your grandchildren will be repaying that loan that had no benefit whatsoever for Hungary,” he said, asking young Tisza supporters to wake up and to make their own and their children’s future a priority.
He said this election campaign is special because it is in the focus of international attention. In fact, the secret services of some countries are working here in the territory of Hungary. “Slowly, Hungary can be regarded as an area of Ukrainian secret service operations,” he indicated, adding that this shows that this election has a stake that points beyond Hungary itself.
“They’re not coming here for our sake, but because they know precisely that two forces are up against each other in Europe today: the anti-war and the pro-war forces.” Those who put Ukraine before their own people and those who put their own people before everything else. Hungary is an unavoidable road obstacle for the pro-Ukraine European forces that want war.
Hungary cannot be dragged into this war and Hungary is living proof for every European country that if you want to, you can stay out. This is why the Hungarian elections have become so important for foreigners as well.
He also highlighted: the Ukrainians are not fussy when it comes to the means they resort to, we are up against a very dangerous country, “a terrorist state,” but we will not give in to terror.
Mr Orbán said we negotiate with everyone as peace-loving and tolerant people, but no one can ever blackmail and threaten the thousand-year-old Hungary, thereby trying to gain the upper hand with us. We will never allow this to happen.
He added: this is why the government decided at its meeting today that as Ukraine imposed “an oil blockade” on Hungary, Hungary will gradually – honouring the existing contracts – shut down gas supplies to Ukraine, and “until we get our oil, they will not get a single cubic metre of gas from Hungary.”
He also said the Ukrainians will have to restart the Druzhba crude oil pipeline, by hook or by crook, because until they do so, they will not receive any financial support from Brussels, given that the Hungarian government will block this.
Mr Orbán stated: Fidesz and the Christian Democratic People’s Party will win the elections with such a majority that will take everyone, the whole world by surprise. The Prime Minister said he has been in politics for a long time, he knows his own people and his own supporters, people with a set of civic, patriotic and Christian values. “Our kind is such that they always pay their taxes at the last minute. […] And this is what happens when it comes to elections as well,” he pointed out.
In continuation, he said Tisza supporters can come up with any “fiction” or poll results: the supporters of the government side have come forward and they are more and more as the elections are approaching. “In the end, everyone will come forward, everyone will stand up, everyone will present themselves, and we will win these elections with a majority that will take everyone, the whole world by surprise. Because everywhere I go, I see that we are in the majority,” he stated.
We have experience, and experience is the toughest currency in European politics, Mr Orbán stressed, taking the view that it takes a clear head, cold blood and a firm hand to keep Hungary out of the war and to say no to the pocketing of the country. Only Fidesz and the Christian Democratic People’s Party can offer that to Hungary, he laid down.
The Prime Minister asked his audience to support local candidate of the Fidesz-Christian Democratic People’s Party Gábor Erős, stressing that in order for the government to be stable, strong and predictable, they need honest and loyal people such as Mr Erős.
Mr Orbán described the opponent of the government party candidate for Member of Parliament as “a drug user” who is “a permanent threat” to Hungary; such a person is open to blackmail. He asked the people of Esztergom not to send such a person who is open to blackmail to the Hungarian Parliament.
Tisza supporters, the Ukrainians and Brussels are all threatening the government side, “but we can be neither threatened, nor blackmailed because only the Hungarians can decide on the future of Hungary,” Mr Orbán laid down.
“They’re threatening us from everywhere because they want a change of governments in Hungary and a non-patriotic government to lead Hungary in the next four years. I’m travelling around the country in order to demonstrate: we will not allow this to happen, we can be neither threatened, nor blackmailed because only the Hungarians can decide on the future of Hungary,” the Prime Minister said.
He stressed: together with Minister of Foreign Affairs and Trade Péter Szijjártó and Minister for Construction and Transport János Lázár, they agreed to reach every corner of the country in this campaign and “to plough” the whole country. “Because if the trumpet falters, then who will come to battle?” he asked the question.
He described the past four years as unfair, saying that the country has found itself in trouble we were not responsible for. In wartimes, we are working in vain, we are unable to reach a high economic growth, he stressed, adding that they did not get scared, they did not try to make excuses, but tried to make the best of this situation.
We are the only country in Europe where though there is only a one per cent economic growth, we have increased the minimum wage by 11 per cent, he said, adding that while all other states have introduced austerity measures, they have launched a housing programme that is unprecedented on the whole of the continent.
Mr Orbán recalled that they had restored the thirteenth monthly pension and had started introducing the fourteenth monthly. Since 2010, they have raised the number of people with jobs from 3.6 million to 4.7 million, and he agreed – should they obtain the electorate’s trust – to increase this number to five million and to raise the average wage to one million forints by the end of the next term, as well as to also continue the policy that supports families.
“I’m sure that we agree on one thing, that the family is the most important. If there are children, there is a future, if there are no children, there is no future,” he said, stating, with reference to the tax exemption of mothers with minimum two children, that they accomplished something in the shadow of the war which the whole world marvels at.
Mr Orbán recalled: his government has doubled Hungary’s national assets, the country’s foreign currency reserves had never been this high, and the country’s gold reserves have increased from three tonnes to 103 tonnes. “What we have pledged in the past four years and has been the most important – staying out of the war – we have fully honoured,” Mr Orbán stated, highlighting that what is happening in Ukraine is not our war, but the fratricidal war of two Slavic peoples, and we do not owe the Ukrainians anything.
He recalled: Hungary helped the people in trouble, fleeing from the war, opened Ukrainian-language schools for their children, despite the fact that “they treated and continue treat our Hungarians badly” in their own country and Hungarian schools are being closed down. We did everything that Christian conscience and honour demanded of us vis-à-vis the Ukrainians in trouble. We do not owe them anything, he said, adding that we could talk about instead what they owe us, but as the Hungarian is not the usurer type, we do not present the bill.
Mr Orbán summarised the difference between his supporters and Tisza supporters by laying down that at their rally, one saw only love, unity and dedication to the country. “We don’t disparage anyone, we don’t want to snarl at anyone because we know that after the elections, at the end of the day, we’re all Hungarians. We will win the elections, and then we will have to forge national unity in which we will need everyone in order to rise to the challenges facing Hungary,” the Prime Minister pointed out.
He asked the supporters of the Tisza Party not to harden their hearts in the campaign because after the elections, “we will have to talk to each other again.”
What is at stake, he said in continuation, is that as the war is coming ever closer to us, whether we will succeed in renewing the alliance which we forged against the war in 2022. “In fact, we will need even more votes than we had in 2022 as you can only stay out of the war with national unity.”
He also said it is not enough to not want war, you must be able to stay out of it, and we can only do so if we have a government behind which there is national unity on the issue of peace. This is why we need the widest possible support, he pointed out.
At the end of his speech, thanking his supporters for all forms of support, Mr Orbán asked everyone to speak to their neighbours, family members and work colleagues, and tell them what is at stake in the elections: “if there is a patriotic government, our country will be safe; if there is a pro-Ukraine government, we will lose everything the country has worked for in the past 16 years.”
“I promise you that we will have fantastic years ahead of us if we continue to maintain the alliance that we forged against war back in 2022,” Mr Orbán stated.
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