He added that there would be no national independence without a Hungarian banking system and media.

“We now have our independence,” he said, warning however that this independence would have to be protected “from time to time”.

“We are not only a civic government but a government of the nation,” Orbán said. “The homeland comes before all else.”

“Our fame, renown and influence punches above the country’s size and economic weight,” he said.

Orbán insisted that eight years of the Fidesz governing in alliance with the Christian Democrats had led to the end of “political correctness” in the country and of “euro-blah-blah, prissy liberalism and politically correct hot air”.

“We are sending the muzzle back to Brussels and the leash back to the IMF.” “Here in Budapest, we say what we think and do as we say,” Orbán said, adding that this was a great luxury in today’s European political climate.

Addressing the 30 years of the Fidesz party, he emphasised the party’s “anti-communism and patriotism”. Fidesz, he added, was different from the country’s other parties because “we love Hungary passionately and we would do anything for
it.”

Orbán bemoaned what he insisted was the lamentable state of Hungary’s opposition parties. “Hungary deserves better,” he said. “It is no wonder there seems to be a general will to change the opposition rather than the government,” he said.

Orbán addressed the issue of migration, saying the issue had “cast a dark shadow over Europe”. He warned that 60 million people, according to a NATO assessment, were poised to migrate to Europe by 2020. Most of the would-be migrants were from Muslim countries and they would form “a clear Muslim majority in Europe’s metropolises.”

“London won’t be the exception but the rule,” he added.

Speaking behind a lectern carrying the slogan “Hungary comes first”, the prime minister spoke about “the dispute between western and central Europe”, insisting that western Europe had become a zone of immigration and mixed populations, while central Europe was moving in the direction of a new future of development in various ways.

Orbán spoke of Hungary’s role as a bastion against migration, praising the “exemplary performance of the Hungarian police force” and the double border fence which “has successfully protected the country’s southern border”.

He warned, however, of dangers coming from the west, saying politicians in Berlin, Brussels and Paris were “the source of that danger” because they pressured Hungary into adopting policies “that have turned their lands into immigrant countries and opened the door to the decline of Christianity and the spread of Islam.”

“It’s fashionable these days to say that Hungary should be similar to them out of solidarity ... so let’s make it clear: Hungary stands in solidarity with those western Europeans and their leaders who want to save their countries and their Christian culture,” Orbán said. “We think that Christianity is Europe’s last hope,” he said.

Orbán said the Visegrad Group was stable and that Austria had recently “turned towards patriotic, Christian policies”. He added that Germany’s CSU and Italy’s Forza Italia were symbols of “common sense and national and cultural confidence”.

Meanwhile, he accused leftist politicians of trying and failing to do harm to Hungary. He listed former Austrian chancellors Werner Faymann and Christian Kern, former Italian PM Matteo Renzi and former Croatian PM Zoran Milanović, as well as Germany’s Martin Schulz as examples of people who had attacked the Hungarian government but who had got nowhere.

The “antagonistic forces”, George Soros’s network and the bureaucrats “on his payroll” are far from giving up, he said.

“Some still sniff the money; others don’t want to lose their positions or wages drawn from globalist elites.”

The government, he said, would “not stand idly by while there are those who are crafting the implementation of the
Soros Plan.

” The “Stop Soros” bill was the first step, he said. Accordingly, he noted that anyone preoccupied with migration and migrants would have to apply for a national security licence to carry out their activities and the government would redirect a portion of foreign donations for “migrant-friendly NGOs” towards border protection.

Further, the NGOs would have to be transparent about their finances and those “who fail to abort their dangerous plans will be banned, however powerful or rich they may be”.

“We will also fight in the international arena,” he said, adding that on Monday he will hand over to the holder of the rotating European Council presidency a European legislative proposal for ensuring the “airtight protection” of Europe’s borders.

Orbán also pledged to fight against the “Soros plan” in Brussels and the United Nations.

“We are not alone and we are going to fight to curb Soros’s plan, as presented in Brussels and at the UN, or to stop it if we can find allies. We have good a chance of doing so, and I think we will prevail in the end,” he said, concluding his speech with his customary slogan: “Go Hungary; go Hungarians”.

MTI photo: Máthé Zoltán