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HUNGARY’S POPULIST Prime Minister Viktor Orban suffered a blow last night in his revolt against the EU, after a referendum aimed at rejecting a contested migrant quota plan was voided after not enough voters turned out.
Although a whopping 99.8% of voters backed his bid to reject the proposal, overall turnout fell well short of a 50% threshold.
Only 3.3 million of the eight-million-strong electorate cast a valid vote, and the National Election Committee declared the referendum void after counting the ballots on Sunday evening.
Opposition figures swiftly called on Orban to step down over the vote, after rights groups had accused him of whipping up anti-migrant fears despite there being only a few hundred asylum seekers in Hungary.
The firebrand leader downplayed the significance of the low turnout and vowed there would be “legal consequences” regardless.
“Brussels or Budapest, that was the question, and the people said Budapest,” he defiantly told supporters gathered in the capital on Sunday evening.
I will propose to change the constitution (which) shall reflect the will of the people. We will make Brussels understand that it cannot ignore the will of Hungarian voters.
Orban did not reveal further details of the proposed amendment.
“It looks like (Orban) wants to continue his fight with the EU on its migration policy, and the constitutional amendment is his way of doing that as it might trigger legal fights” with Brussels, analyst Bulcsu Hunyadi told AFP.
Unrealistic
The firebrand leader has emerged as the standard-bearer of those opposed to German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s “open-door” policy, in the wake of Europe’s worst migration crisis since the Second World War.
The EU migrant quota proposal, spearheaded by Merkel and approved by most EU governments last year after antagonistic debates, seeks to ease pressure on frontline countries Italy and Greece, the first port of arrival for most migrants.
But implementation has been slow.
Eastern and central European nations vehemently oppose the plan aimed at relocating 160,000 people, many of who fled war in Syria.
Neighbouring Austria’s Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz said yesterday that the EU should stop clinging to its troubled plan.
“The target is totally unrealistic,” he told the German daily Welt am Sonntag, warning that disagreements over the plan could threaten “the cohesion of the entire European Union”.
Hungary has not accepted a single one of the 1,294 refugees allocated to it under the scheme and instead joined Slovakia in filing a legal challenge against it.
Top EU officials had warned the referendum threatened to further split the quarrelling bloc, already weakened by Britain’s vote in June to leave the union – a decision Orban has blamed on the EU’s handling of the migrant crisis.
Brussels elite
The referendum asked voters: “Do you want the EU to be able to mandate the obligatory resettlement of non-Hungarian citizens into Hungary even without the approval of the National Assembly?”
In an editorial, Orban warned on Saturday that Hungarians had “a duty” to fight the failed “liberal methods” of the “Brussels elite.”
“It’s true that the campaign was exaggerated but no-one can tell me if these migrants really are refugees of war,” Zoltan, a 38-year-old lawyer and ‘No’ voter, told AFP earlier yesterday.
More than 400,000 refugees trekked through Hungary toward northern Europe in 2015 before Hungary sealed off its southern borders with razor wire in the autumn and brought in tough anti-migrant laws, reducing the flow to a trickle.
Other countries on the so-called Balkan migrant trail followed suit, leaving some 60,000 migrants stranded in Greece.
Many of those migrants live in grim conditions in camps dotted around the Aegean islands and the mainland, desperate to continue their onward journey.
The EU said last week it hoped to relocate half of them by the end of 2017.
A deal struck in March with Ankara to halt the influx looks shaky in the wake of a coup attempt in Turkey in July.
German Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere meanwhile said on Sunday that Berlin wants to reinstate an EU rule, suspended in 2011, to return asylum seekers who entered the bloc via Greece to be forced to return there.
“We will take up discussions on this in a meeting with (EU) interior ministers” later in October, he told the Greek daily Kathimerini.
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Kenny has a nice EU commissioner role awaiting him in Brussels, which is his 30 pieces of silver for not burning the bondholders but burdened the Irish taxpayers with debt.
@Permo Dermo: that wasn’t him. Blame that lying bast@rd Brian Cowan for that
@jason bourne: Actually jason it was Enda “its not our debt” that put us on the rack,
@Permo Dermo:
Please. The people who burdened the Irish taxpayers with debt were the public sector unions, who’s refusal to give an inch on their bloated pay and pensions during the recession led to a €20 billion annual deficit, every year. The bank bailout was small change compared to that.
@Fred Jensen: €20 > €64?? oh ya I forgot you’re probably using leprechaun economics.
@Fred Jensen: You are some moron aren’t you if you believe that. Aside from the incontrovertible fact that every public sector employee took a fairly hefty pay cut, one which is only now beginning to be only slightly undone, and had a public sector only pension levy applied, how could anyone forget that it was the failure of private sector organisations – banks and property developers among others – that caused the recession and economic collapse. Don’t be so daft
@Fred Jensen: Fred would you ever cop on to yourself.
Why wasn’t tosser listed.
Well this gombeen ever exit the stage.he sold out his own people in favour of the EU,has to be the most embarrassing leader ever
The sheer arrogance of the man, did the same when it came to announcing the date of the last General Election, flip-flopping around for months, unwilling to inform the Irish people when they would be allowed to cast their vote, forgetting that he is nothing more than a PUBLIC SERVANT. Should be in jail for treason.
Surely Seannachi-in-chief. I know a homeless fella on a bench in merrion square with a pint in each hand who will second him for the role, as soon as he’s finished phoning everyone to tell them how much extra water is in his taps thanks to fine gael.
He wasn’t good enough to be taoiseach never mind any of the other jobs. The fact that the EU people see him as a soft touch to advance their own objectives (hence all the EU praise) will rule him out for all of those jobs. I can’t remember one important decision he’s made in the 6 years he’s been taoiseach, except that announcement for the immigrant vote referendum a few months back which will mean nothing to most of us.
@Adrian: The Aqueduct?
“Recently, there has been speculation that Kenny should be kept on as Brexit minister.”
Why would we want “its not our debt” any were near important discussions…..
40 years as a TD, stayed under the radar for 30 odd years collecting his wages and then spent the past few years keeping his masters in Brussels happy to make sure he gets a plum job in Europe. He’s done very well for “himself” and will be looked after while phase two austerity continues to be implemented under stealth taxes and lack of investment in public services. That’s his legacy and as long as the Irish people continue to FF/FG, many more entitled TD’s will enrich themselves on the back of the gullible Irish voter.
While he collects his Taoiseach’s massive pension pot and then the 100k lump sum and the 30k a year teachers pension, he can think about it.
Prison cell
@Jonathan Yeo: so it’s a crime to save a country from economic ruins?
@Negan: lol
@Negan: what planet are you on, I’d like to visit for a few hours.
What about absolute waster?
Quentin Tarantino is looking for a new gimp for Pulp Fiction 2
Would his incompetence be put up with anywhere else.
@William Clay: Only in the EU…..
He could get a job working for Dinny?
Like Cowan did.
Who would have him the circus wouldn’t take him!!
@vinnie Monaghan. Cos he already holds that job title.
He should be booted out of politics.
Why doesn’t he volunteer and dosomething worthwhile ? Why a job with a big salary and yet another pension?
A bog in his beloved mayo,,bury him in it
@Shane O Malley: Shane with a name like O Malley at u sure u wouldn’t like to be buried with him.
@Shane O Malley: Yes he should go back to mayo & cut turf, at least he would be doing something constructive & not costing the taxpayer more money
Backbencher?
@Dylan McKane: backstabber you mean surely
Go back teaching-ar u. Joking-he couldn’t teach a donkey.He will b over in the canaries rubbing the sun cream onto Finnullas back.
Enda wants the private lick arse job to Merkel.
have your say