Orban: Hungarians Freedom Fighters

(MTI) – Hungarians are freedom fighters who only feel good if they live in an “order of freedom”, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said in Sopronpuszta on Tuesday.

Addressing a commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the Pan-European Picnic near the border with Austria, Orban said the level of freedom has indisputably improved over the past 25 years and in this respect the democratic transition has earned top marks. At the same time, inflation remains and state debt is high, while unemployment, public assets and public order have become worse, he added.

Good performance should be kept and the bad must be changed, Orban said.

In the second half of the eighties it was a given idea that the “ragged East” should take over the western model, but by now it is clear that western Europe’s economy is extremely vulnerable, too, he said.

“Today we must think about what is good for Hungarians here and now, and not where things are done better (…),” he said.

Orban said that because of cultural differences Hungary cannot borrow from Chinese, Russian, Japanese or South Korean models, but, at the same time, it cannot join a western European track which is clearly losing its reserves, and perhaps it has already depleted them.

Orban said Hungary would soon catch up with the Europaen Union’s average wages, if the current economic policies can continue and economic growth can be boosted from the 2-4 percent range into the 4-6 percent range.