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Zsolt Törőcsik: On Wednesday US president Donald Trump and Russian president Vladimir Putin spoke on the telephone about the Russo–Ukrainian war, and the parties agreed on the need to end the conflict. Events then accelerated, and yesterday the Kremlin said that preparations for a summit had begun. I’ll be asking Prime Minister Viktor Orbán how this might affect Hungary. Good morning.
Good morning.
It seems that since the telephone conversation, diplomatic events have been moving at a higher speed. How do you rate the chances of negotiations starting now?
If I had to comment in one word, I’d say “Hallelujah!” This is what we’ve been waiting for, what we’ve bet on, what we’ve trusted in, what we’ve predicted and prepared for, and what we’ve built our Hungarian strategy on: that, after the Europeans have proved to be paralysed and incapacitated, the war won’t be prolonged, but that a new American president who wants peace will come along and cut this Gordian knot, and will create peace. This is confirmed by the news of the start of negotiations. What we Hungarians should take from this is that sticking to our position has been worthwhile. For a long time, for three years, there were two of us who were in favour of peace: us and the Vatican. What is quite absurd is that on a continent that has suffered two world wars, in a war as serious as the Russo–Ukrainian war, there were only two European countries left that were arguing for peace and saying that peace is good and war is bad, while the others said that war is good and peace is bad. It’s still an absurd situation, but now there are three of us – and this third one isn’t just of any size, but is a big elephant capable of changing the power relations. So I’m very happy that the voice of peace in the Western world is now called Donald Trump.
If we look at it in a little more detail and from Hungary’s perspective, what’s the significance for our country of this détente – whether in terms of policy for Hungarian communities, geopolitics or economics?
If we want to talk about this, we need to divide it in two. This issue has a spiritual dimension or domain, and an economic one. If we look at the spiritual dimension, what’s happening is that one of the pillars of the Western world – the strongest one, the United States – has initiated a change that’s setting the whole Western world’s system of values, its way of thinking, on a new track. This process is moving forward much faster than many had thought. What we call the “Trump tornado” is now knocking – even pounding – on Europe’s door. Let’s look at what’s changing the Western mindset. First let’s talk about war, since you’ve started with that. We’ve been told that it’s good to go to war, and that anyone who speaks about peace is Putin’s poodle, a puppet, and is in a morally reprehensible position. So Western thinking has described the position of peace as a morally abhorrent one. Now it turns out that no, peace is good and war is bad. Migration. Everywhere in Western Europe it’s taught that supporting migrants is good and opposing migration is bad. Now the US president has come along and said no, migration is bad, and a border protection policy that stops migration is good. It’s the same with climate and green issues, where it’s been said that it’s good for green policy to come before all other considerations, and anyone who gives equal status to any other consideration is wrong. Now it turns out that this isn’t the case. Of course, it’s good if the world is cleaner, healthier and greener, but this mustn’t be achieved at the expense of economic rationality. So the right approach is that we shouldn’t be pursuing green policy in opposition to business, but together with business life, with economic life. The same holds true for gender, where it’s been said that what’s elegantly called “the binary world” – a world made up of men and women – is at an end, because there are all kinds of intermediate, transitional, optional states. This is called “gender”, it’s good, and anyone who opposes it is medieval, conservative, retrograde, and things like that. And the Americans say, no: a person is either male or female, this is the good position, and the other approach is unnatural. It’s the same with the family. The family, the traditional family, has been portrayed as a form of coexistence left over from the past, and other configurations have been promoted. Now the Americans are saying, no, the traditional family is good, and anything that differs from it should be treated with caution. The situation is the same with Christianity and the community of believers, because Christianity has been constantly mocked – along with the family – as the antithesis of reason, as simply blind faith, something left over from the Middle Ages but not relevant to modern life. And the American president says no, faith is good, a community of faith is good, and Christianity is a precious tradition. So on these six issues I think Western European thinking is undergoing a very rapid change. Europe is resisting this. Hungary isn’t, of course, because our thinking has always been in line with what the President is saying: we were “Trump before Trump”, as they say in America. So for us it’s validation, but in most European countries it will bring major changes. And if you look at the economy, at the sanctions, the war sanctions, Hungary has been losing 6.5 billion euros a year – so around 20 billion euros in total. That’s a huge amount of money! So if the US president comes along, makes peace and reaches an agreement, I think Russia will be reintegrated into the world economy, reintegrated into the European security system, and even into the European energy and economic system. This will give a huge boost to the Hungarian economy. It’s a great opportunity. We have a lot to gain from peace.
You’ve said that Europe’s resisting. Staying with war for one more question, the High Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs has written that Europe is also asking for a seat at the negotiating table. And you responded that this has to be earned. What do you think the chances are that Europe will have a say in what happens in its neighbourhood on the question of settlement of the war?
In order to spare your listeners I try not to make shocking statements early in the morning, because everyone likes to start their morning at work in a friendly and good-humoured way; but the truth is that the world of politics isn’t like that. It’s not friendly and it’s not good-humoured – I’m talking about international politics. So if someone doesn’t stand up for themselves, they can’t expect someone else to stand up for them. If you do nothing for peace, and indeed to war first, you can’t then expect someone else who wants peace to come along and say, “You know, all of you can come along with us anyway.” That’s not how it works. So the world of international politics is tough, interest-based, and often ruthless. Insight is a great virtue, but it’s not always decisive in international politics. So I have to say that seats at the negotiating table aren’t automatically allocated: you’re allowed there because you’ve stood up for yourself, you’ve fought for yourself and you’re needed. So I have to say that it’s not clear why Europe – which has always supported war and is supporting war – should have a seat at such a negotiating table. As far as we Hungarians are concerned, I can tell you that we’ll be there wherever important Hungarian interests are at stake, in the right place, in a place that’s appropriate to our weight; and we’ll stand up for Hungarian interests, and I’ll get Hungary everything it needs. But we’ve always been on the side of peace, and the others on the side of war. If they want a place at the table, they’ll have to struggle hard for it.
Moving on to another issue, migration, you’ve said that Europe is still resisting the turn of events that we’re seeing in the world. Yesterday there was news of another attack, this time in Munich, with at least thirty people injured. But in the last month and a half there have also been similar reports from Belgium, Sweden and the Netherlands. How does what we’ve seen in recent weeks and months affect the daily lives of people in Germany and Western Europe?
It’s often true that people aren’t happy to be right. This is one such situation. Since 2015 we’ve been telling everyone – not just the Germans, but the whole of Europe – not to lose their common sense. So it flies in the face of common sense to let millions of people into your country as the result of an illegal international business organised by people smugglers who are making serious money, and to think that something good will come of it. I understand that there was a lot of pressure on them. George Soros published the Soros Plan, the existence of which for some mysterious reason the Left here in Hungary constantly denies – even though it was published in writing, signed by George Soros, and everyone could see it with their own eyes, as I could. That’s right, there is a Soros Plan, in which our fine compatriot wrote that the European Union must let in one million migrants every year. Nine years on, and nine million migrants have arrived in Europe. This plan is successfully operating. European leaders, politicians, people smugglers, criminals, NGOs and illegal networks are working on it, in a grand scheme to procure and bring in foreigners who don’t belong here, who in most cases don’t come here with peaceful intentions, and who don’t want to work here, but rather want to live off our money. This is what’s happening. Nothing good can come of this. For a long time the Germans claimed that something good would come of this, that they’d manage it, that it would be good, that it would be beneficial. Terrorism has appeared, violence has arrived in Europe, public safety has been eroding, and the economic burdens are becoming unbearable. We Hungarians aren’t happy that time has vindicated us. What we are happy about is that we’ve been left out of this. We’re talking about a European disease and a European problem that hasn’t infected Hungary. It seems that God doesn’t want to destroy us. In politics, there’s a well-known saying that when God wants to destroy someone, first He robs them of their wits. He hasn’t robbed us of ours, but has left us with them intact. And from the first moment we stood with both feet on the ground and knew that this was a threat and that we had to defend ourselves against it. I don’t know how many years we’ve been kicked and had our chests stamped on, paying a million euros a day for not letting them in, and resisting the European migration pact; we’ve rebelled against it, and we’ve held out. But it’s still cheaper to pay the penalty, the daily penalty, than to let them in and then have to pay out money to finance the consequences. So I think that Hungary has been on the right path here, and this is also confirmed by the change in the US. At the border of the United States the President of the United States of America is doing exactly what we’ve done and are doing at Hungary’s southern border. Now, what effect will this have? This raises what we’re talking about, and I interpret your question as raising a democracy problem. Because, as you say, the majority of Germans – the last polls I saw showed a majority of 69–70 per cent – are in favour of a stricter immigration policy. This, incidentally, was rejected by the people’s elected leaders in a parliamentary debate in Germany. This isn’t only about migration, but also about what we’re living in now: is parliamentarianism still a democracy? Now, of course, on detailed technical issues – the budget, economic regulation – it often happens that a government and the majority of the people don’t agree. This happens. But on fundamental questions of existence, if there’s a divergence between the needs, positions and demands of the people and the positions of those elected by them, let’s say the elite, this raises a democracy problem. And there’s no more fundamental and essential issue than migration. So if the country’s leaders and the people aren’t on the same page, then sooner or later there must be some consequences. The democratic system cannot cope with this divergence of opinion. Someone has to yield, the system will undergo a correction. The people are lower down, but I think the more likely outcome is that after all the tide will rule; and even though the leaders are above, they’ll have to acquiesce.
Now, in Germany, it’s the AfD that’s calling for the strictest possible immigration policy, and this week you received the party’s Chancellor candidate, Alice Weidel. What was the purpose of this meeting on Wednesday, and how could it affect Hungarian–German relations, even after the elections?
The first goal was what I’ve been saying here: I think that the German political system will correct itself, and it will raise up those actors who are on the side of the people on fundamental issues. It will raise them up in one step, two steps, suddenly or slowly – we don’t know, as politics is full of such mysteries, but we do know that it will happen. And the AfD is one such party. On migration they say exactly what people want to hear and what people want. But it’s also the same on the economy: they want tax cuts; they want to save the middle class and maintain the purchasing power of their incomes; they want what the people want in international politics. We all feel that Brussels is abusing its power, the bureaucrats, as Ms. Weidel has said: the Brussels alien is taking powers away from the nation states, and error after error is being made. We must give powers back to the nation states, because under the original EU rules many of the powers that were taken away never belonged to Brussels – they’ve always been within national powers. So she’s saying all sorts of things that I think are in line with what Germans think. Incidentally, they’re also in line with what Hungarians think – although she’s not our leader, but will be the leader of the Germans one day. So I thought that she’s the future, and that the AfD and its president are the future. I wanted to know what the consequences of what she stands for would be for Hungary. And I wanted to find this out not only on paper, but also in person. So I asked all the questions that relate to this. And what I found out was that if the economic policy she says she wants to see in Germany – the foreign policy she advocates, the migration policy she’s fighting for, the European policy she’s proposing – were to be implemented in Germany, then all of it would be good for Hungary. The advance of the AfD is described in the German media as some kind of scourge, with the “far right” breaking through. I don’t want to interfere in that, it’s their business, but I have to say that the breakthrough of this force – its strengthening and the foothold it’s gaining – is a good thing for Hungary.
Speaking of the economy, Germany has had two years of virtually stagnant or declining economic figures, and similar results are expected in Berlin this year. And we’ve seen that here at home, too, industrial production in December fell by more than 6 per cent, and in January inflation rose. How can the Government offset this German effect?
This is the greatest intellectual challenge for the current government, the Hungarian national government; yet we’ve been aware of this not since yesterday morning, but since 2010–11. Back then I was personally convinced that the European Union is done for. So if the Germans and the French don’t come up with something on this and set the European Union on a new course, its days are numbered. If things continue like this there will be no need to leave it: it will fall apart on its own. So forcing an exit or suggesting that we should do so is a pointless proposal. The European Union has a positive mission, and if it were well organised, it would serve the interests of the Member States well. I’d still say that Hungary should rather be inside; but it must also be recognised that the European Union cannot survive like this. So if anyone has read the report of, say, Mr. Draghi, the former Italian prime minister, the former President of the European Central Bank, this is what he describes. So what I’ve just said isn’t the Hungarian position, it’s not a Hungarian criticism of the EU, it’s not Hungary’s intention to leave the EU. That’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about what he says. One of Europe’s most respected economists says that the EU will be finished unless it makes some radical changes urgently. And the window of opportunity is short: two to three years. We European prime ministers have discussed this document. We agreed what should be done, and I’ll say a few words about that. But then we did nothing. That was in October and November, now it’s February, and nothing has happened. So I think the European Union is finished if we don’t urgently do two things. The first is that energy prices have to come down. The current situation is bad for families; but what’s perhaps even worse, European companies are going out of business. So if a European company pays two to three times more for electricity and four to five times more for gas than its competitors in China or America, then this economy will go bust. And today the price is high because of a European regulation. Of course war has a role to play, but there’s a bad energy policy called the Green Deal, which I think is dead. If we force this through, we’ll destroy the European economy. We have to change this, because it’s burying us. The second thing that needs to change is the creation of a European capital market. This sounds complicated, but it simply means that today our rivals – the Arab countries, the Americans, the Asians – are implementing economic policies that encourage European capital to leave Europe and be invested elsewhere. The new US administration is at the forefront of this, using regulation and inducements to persuade the big European factories, the owners of capital, not to develop in Europe, not to continue their work here, but to do it somewhere else – in America for example. This is why the German car industry, for example, is in huge trouble. The defence against this is for us to make a better offer to European capital – to European big business – than it gets from America, China and other parts of the world. To do this we need a single capital market. And it’s just a question of will. Twenty-seven of us sit at the table, and if we could agree on this, which Hungary wholeheartedly supports, this capital market would be created. Then we’d already be able to keep the financial resources needed to run the economy – in other words the money itself – here in Europe. If we don’t do this, there will be trouble. So energy price cuts and keeping the money here in Europe; otherwise, the European Union is finished.
At the same time, the Government is also trying to support Hungarian small and medium-sized enterprises or micro-enterprises. This is the purpose of the measure to raise the threshold for the tax exemption from 12 million forints to 18 million forints. How many businesses are affected? And what are the practical benefits for them and for the economy?
If you’ll allow me, I’ll finish my answer to the previous question; because what I said was an analysis, not a political decision. So we see Europe struggling to survive, drowning there, being carried away by the Rhine and the Danube, struggling to survive – and it’s not certain that it will survive this. But we mustn’t think about Europe, we must think about Hungary. Because we’re not Europeans first and foremost, we’re Hungarians. We’re European because we’re Hungarians. So the Hungarian interest comes first. And I could paraphrase the American president: “Hungary before all else!” So we must have an economic policy that works if the European Union is successful, and that works even if it isn’t. This is what I called the intellectual challenge earlier, what you call the German effect. So we mustn’t be wholly dependent on the European economy. Of course we can’t escape its influence, but it’s a question of the extent and direction of that influence. We can’t pretend that we’re not where we are, as part of the European single market; but it’s possible to create an economic policy that mitigates the negative effects of Europe’s malaise and floundering, and that opens up opportunities in other directions. For this, what we primarily need to do is to change our mindset. We must recognise that the world’s economic future won’t be written in Europe. This is what we’ve been used to. Our thinking was that this is how it’s been for hundreds of years, and that it would continue to be so: that the events and policies that determine the fate of the Earth and the world economy would be shaped in Europe – perhaps together with the Americans. But this isn’t the case. The future isn’t being written in Europe: it’s being written in Asia, it’s being written in the Arab world, it’s being written in the emerging countries; and if President Donald Trump is successful, it will be written in America – but certainly not in Europe. Therefore we mustn’t get trapped in the idea that we’ve always been the best, we’re the best now, and we’ll be the best in the future. We need to admit that this is over. This is why the Hungarian economy needs to develop special links with the world’s truly successful, increasingly wealthy powerhouses: the United States, China itself, several countries in Asia, the Arab world, and so on. We need to break out of our European isolation and we need to operate foreign economic policy based on what we call connectivity, on relationships. The Hungarian economy is able to give people the standard of living that it does because it can sell products produced in Hungary on the world market. This is what we call an export-oriented economy. And our exports account for 80 to 85 per cent of Hungary’s total GDP. So we must produce, trade and sell – otherwise we’ll be in trouble, and we won’t be able to maintain our standard of living. And today the best place to trade and sell isn’t with Europe, but with other emerging parts of the world. Now, what does this mean in the reality on the ground? It means that Hungarian small and medium-sized enterprises need to be supported – for example in their efforts to establish contacts abroad. We’re helping them, for example, to finally digitalise their operations, to go online, to connect to international trade. Small and medium-sized enterprises need to be helped to stand on their own two feet. This is why we’re launching a capital injection programme, the Demján Programme. And we need to support – and here I come to your question, after a very long digression – those businesses that are what we call sole traders. The Hungarian economy gives us the opportunity to do this; in bureaucratic language, they’re called VAT-exempt businesses. In Hungary now they number somewhere between 850,000 and 900,000. Now they’re taxed by paying a simplified, lower tax up to a certain amount of their income, thereby offering them a big tax break. Who are we talking about? Hairdressers, bakers, taxi drivers, small building contractors: that’s the world we’re talking about, and in Hungary there are between 850,000 and 900,000 of them. If I count them together with their domestic partners, assuming that most of them don’t live alone, and not even counting children, that still makes 1.8 million people. And now we’re saying that the tax-free income threshold will increase from 12 million to 18 million forints. That’s a 50 per cent increase! And it’s worth talking about this now because it’s not automatic. So these entrepreneurs have to apply for it, they have to register now. There’s a deadline for this, which is the end of February. We’re now in the middle of February. I’d urge, encourage, remind these people – hundreds of thousands of Hungarians – that it’s worth choosing this form of business, and that they shouldn’t miss the deadline, as it’s a limitation deadline, after which they can’t be included in the scheme.
We have very little time left, but let’s make sure we touch on two economic issues. The first is that pensioners received their thirteenth month’s payment this week; but at the same time, several opposition parties have been talking about the need to adjust pensions, in light of the inflation figures for January. How do you now assess the current situation of pensioners?
We have a system, quite an honest system, which says that at the beginning of the year, based on the data published by the National Bank, we’ll determine what inflation will be and we’ll increase pensions by at least that much. If we underestimate inflation and raise it higher, we won’t take the money back. This was the case in 2024, when at the end of the year we raised pensions by 2–2.5 per cent above inflation, because we expected inflation to be higher than it turned out to be. This then led to an increase in the real value of pensions. And there are times when we underestimate inflation – or the National Bank underestimates inflation; but then in November – in November of the relevant year – we always correct for that, and in November pensioners get the amount that they should get and are entitled to because of higher inflation. Accurate accounting – long friendship. There’s a strong alliance between pensioners and the Government, including me personally. One needs to acknowledge that the Hungarian pension system is under constant attack – not only from the Hungarian opposition, we can deal with that, but also from Brussels. I’ve reviewed this, and in 2017, we’d already received the first notice to reform the pension system, which would have meant taking away the thirteenth month’s pension, raising the retirement age, and so on. Then the notice was repeated again in 2022. And we’re under constant pressure – partly from experts and partly from Brussels bureaucrats – to give up the thirteenth month’s pension, to restructure it, to cut it, to make it less favourable for pensioners. The Hungarian government is resisting this. I personally have refused to do so and will refuse, and we shall defend pensions. The issue of pensions isn’t simply a question of money, but of respect and recognition, and the elderly – we’re talking about 2.5 million Hungarians who have carried this country on their backs, built it up and kept it alive – mustn’t be treated in the way Brussels would like. That must be rejected, and they must be protected.
Meanwhile Brussels has also called on Hungary to “fully transpose into national law the EU rules on the internal market for electricity.” What does this mean for the reductions in household energy bills?
This is news from yesterday or the day before yesterday. When I read it I thought there was something wrong with my eyesight. So Brussels is demanding that energy suppliers should be free to set their prices. Well, they’d have a fight on their hands! If we or I were to allow energy suppliers to charge people the prices they want, then today families’ utility bills would be at least one and a half times higher, perhaps even twice as high. Today Hungarian families pay the lowest bills in the European Union, and it’s still not easy. Imagine if we only paid the European average. So it’s absolutely essential to protect households, and to beat back against attempts by Brussels to raise the cost of utilities. We’ve been sued for this, so we’ll have to stand up in court, but we won’t give in: we shall protect families.
I’ve been asking Prime Minister Viktor Orbán about subjects including the chances of peace, the migration situation in Europe, and the prospects for the Hungarian economy.
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