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Hungary's Orban Seeks Rule-By-Decree Powers Amid Virus Outbreak

March 30, 2020

Hungary's parliament is expected on March 30 to endorse a bill giving right-wing Prime Minister Viktor Orban sweeping new powers during the state of emergency declared to fight the coronavirus pandemic.

The bill would enable the government to indefinitely extend the state of emergency declared on March 11 and its associated powers of rule by decree, doing away with the current requirement for lawmakers to approve any extension.

The bill, which is virtually certain to pass, as Orban's Fidesz party holds a two-thirds majority in parliament, has prompted harsh criticism from rights groups, the European Union, and the United Nations.

On March 29, four Hungarian civil-society organizations, including the Helsinki Committee rights group, called on the government to amend the bill and introduce a so-called "sunset clause" that provides for the law to cease having effect after a specific date unless lawmakers extend it.

Otherwise, Orban will "have a completely unrestricted mandate for the government...the current draft...basically gives an open-ended carte-blanche mandate," said Marta Pardavi, co-chair of the Hungarian Helsinki Committee.

Since 2010, the 56-year-old nationalist has consolidated power by diminishing the independence of Hungary's courts and media.

Orban has also restricted the activities of nongovernmental organizations, among other actions for which the NATO and EU member country has been criticized at home and in Brussels.

Among the bill's other provisions is criminal punishment for up to five years for anyone spreading "fake news" about the coronavirus pandemic that has infected at least 408 people and killed 15 in Hungary, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University.

Justice Minister Judit Varga has sought to quell fears about the unprecedented powers Orban could receive.

She told journalists on March 27 that critics opposing the bill were "fighting imaginary demons and not dealing with reality."

Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) in Brussels have called for an inquiry into Orban's new law.

"Viktor Orban must not be given a carte blanche to further empower himself and strip away Hungarian citizens' democratic rights under the auspices of tackling the coronavirus," French MEP Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield told The Guardian daily.

UN rights spokesman Rupert Colville told a news conference last week that the bill "appears to give the government practically unlimited powers to rule by decree and bypass parliamentary scrutiny with no clear cut-off date."

Colville said that international law only allows emergency legislation that is limited to the crisis at hand, adding that the bill could "have a potentially chilling effect on freedom of expression in Hungary."

The secretary-general of the Council of Europe, Marija Pejcinovic Buric, sent Orban a letter last week in which she warned against an "indefinite and uncontrolled state of emergency."

With reporting by AFP, dpa, and The Guardian

Source: https://www.rferl.org/a/hungary-s-orban- seeks-rule-by-decree-powers-amid -virus-outbreak/30518114.html

Copyright (c) 2020. RFE/RL, Inc. Reprinted with the permission of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, 1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.