Election committee rejects LMP’s Paks referendum initiative

Budapest, May 25 (MTI) – The National Election Committee (NVB) rejected on Thursday a submission by the green opposition LMP party which had sought approval for referendum questions concerning the secrecy of documentation and the budget related to the planned expansion of the Paks nuclear power plant.

LMP lawmaker Ákos Hadházy turned to the committee with a request to hold a plebiscite on removing the secrecy clauses.

In the proposed referendum, voters would have been asked: “Do you agree that parliament should enact declassification of all documents concerning the upgrade of the Paks nuclear plant?”

The majority of the members of the NVB judged the question to be inadmissible because, among the reasons given, the sides in the agreement to expand the Paks plant had committed themselves to treating data given to each other as a secret.

Hadházy’s second question was: “Do you agree that parliament should enact declassification of all itemised budgets based on which the total cost of the upgrade has been calculated?” The committee rejected the second question with similar arguments as in the first case.

Meanwhile, the committee also rejected seven other referendum initiatives which were similar to each other and aimed at the mandatory screening of the assets of all government officials and municipal leaders as well as their family members.