In the Kontroll website interview released on YouTube late on Monday, the host, Zsolt Totvaradi, said Balasy's business empire had received contracts worth more than 350 billion forints (EUR 962.4m) in recent years, with the majority of the orders coming from cabinet office head Antal Rogan's "propaganda ministry" and the affiliated communications office.

Balasy said he had come to the interview with a notarised document, offering the corporate group he had built to the Hungarian state "with all the knowledge, property rights, and non-property rights contained therein."

He denied all wrongdoing, noting a report alleging that their work had been overpriced. "We can account for everything," he said.

Regarding the value of the businesses in question, Balasy said conservative estimates put their worth at 80 billion forints. Together with the value of its contracts, the companies are worth between 100-200 billion, he said.

He said he was making the offer "because the activities we carried out for the state so far go beyond market communication tasks and performing these tasks is best suited within the public sector." He expressed hope that the move would not put the jobs of the companies' 500 employees at risk.

In his reaction, Radnai said Balasy had been long known "as the Fidesz 'poster boy' [responsible for advertising hoardings], who for the past eight years has essentially monopolised the entire state communications market, embodying every form of corruption we despised in the Orban regime and which we removed for good on April 12."

He said Antal Rogan had spent 1,300 billion forints on propaganda, from which Balasy's companies generated an annual profit of 25 billion forints. All this while, since 2018, almost every major state contract ended up with them. Moreover, a significant portion of the work was not even carried out by them, but by subcontractors, while the profit remained with Balasy throughout.

"We also know that Balasy has option rights in further companies. And let's not forget: this money was not made on the open market. It was paid by us, the Hungarian people!" Radnai wrote in his post.

In the Kontroll interview, when asked about his personal wealth, Balasy said: "I am a wealthy man, but I have invested the majority of the profits earned by my companies; I have also purchased properties for rental purposes and have begun construction projects for my family."

Photo: Youtube Screenshot 

Source: MTI – Hungary’s national news agency since 1881. While MTI articles are usually factual, some may contain political bias, and readers should be aware that such content does not reflect the position of XpatLoop, which is neutral and independent.

Since the goal of XpatLoop is to keep readers well briefed, right across the spectrum of opinions, MTI items are shared to ensure readers are aware of all narratives within the local media.

XpatLoop believes in empowering readers to form their own views through complete and comprehensive coverage. To facilitate this XpatLoop has a balanced range of news partners, as you can see when you surf around XpatLoop.com

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