"To all of those who, as the anointed of the state, have built up fortunes worth hundreds of billions over the past decade and a half, I have a message: Follow the example of Duna Aszfalt. If public monies went to where they don't belong, they should be repaid now, voluntarily," Magyar said.

He warned that later the state would recover those monies anyway, using legal tools.

Magyar noted that Duna Aszfalt, a company that won more than HUF 600bn of state contracts in 2018-2020, had decided on Monday to repay early USD 400m of bonds subscribed by the state-owned Magyar Eximbank and Hungarian Development Bank (MFB) to finance a high-risk road project in Africa.

Magyar said the state had reported to authorities more than 20 cases in which public monies exceeding HUF 1,700bn were used inappropriately under the former government.

He added that those cases included HUF 640bn of exposure involving a rolling stock order from Egypt and a HUF 360bn state loan for North Macedonia, as well as procurements of alert bracelets for seniors, ambulances, school IT systems and government communications.

Earlier on Tuesday, he said the foreign ministry had reported a HUF 300bn procurement of ventilators placed during the pandemic under the former head of the portfolio, Peter Szijjarto.

Magyar also highlighted a probe ordered by the government of state contracts with 4iG group as well as efforts to recover assets from public asset management foundations that are not related to higher education.

He said that more than HUF 3,000bn had been channeled to the foundations, known by their Hungarian acronym KEKVA, under the Orban government.

Magyar said the government measures to recover the assets had been taken even as the National Asset Recovery and Protection Office (NVVH) was in the process of being set up.

He said the opposition Fidesz could try to obstruct the establishment of the office, "but to no avail".

"They, too, know, just as do Orban's relatives, that whatever was taken illegally from the common wealth of the Hungarian people will be recovered by the Hungarian state," he added.

Meanwhile, NVVH cases not expected to lead to binding sentences 'in coming few years' - says Unger

The first six-year mandate of the leader of the National Asset Recovery and Protection Office (NVVH) will suffice to uncover "what happened in this country", but the cases are not expected to end in binding sentences within that period, political scientist Anna Roza Unger said before parliament's judicial and constitutional affairs committee on Tuesday.

Unger, who is vying for the position of head of the NVVH, said the mandate will be enough to launch the procedures "to bring everyone responsible, be it a big man or a small one, a city mouse or a country one, before the court."

This would go for "all who committed it, those who allowed [crimes] to be committed, and for Hungarian society to grasp and learn what had happened so it can never happen again," she said.

The NVVH will work to map the system that created and operated corruption rather than to unveil concrete cases, she said, "so that the newly forming Hungarian democracy may develop an immune system which, after a period of consolidation, makes re-occurrence impossible," Unger said.

Parliament is expected to elect NVVH's leader on Friday and adopt its charter during the autumn session, with the authority expected to be set up later in the season.

Sarvari: NVVH 'must become rule of law'

Hungary's Asset Recovery and Protection Office (NVVH) "should become an integral part of the rule of law", Nicholas Sarvari, the Tisza Party's nominee to head the new organisation, said in parliament's judicial committee on Tuesday.

Sarvari noted that the structure of the authority was defined by law, and said that as its head he would "find the right experts for each task".

The candidate suggested that the way public assets had been handled in Hungary in previous years was "unacceptable", adding that he felt "ashamed as a Hungarian".

Restoring public trust and building transparency will be one of the main tasks of the new authority, he added.

Source: MTI – Hungary’s national news agency since 1881.

MTI photo: Zoltan Balogh

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