Government accused of nurturing sacred cows

A conservative liberal blogger looking back on the past year contends that despite efforts aimed at a wholesale reform, the government has failed to discontinue some unfortunate practices.

“According to the government’s version of events, 2010 was the year of a ballot box revolution. Although the Fidesz-KDNP government claims to have completely overhauled the constitution, there are some issues which seem to resist its revolutionary drive,” Véleményvezér writes.

First of all, Véleményvezér interprets the appointment of new leading officials as a repetition of the past Socialist governments’ habit of helping their intellectual allies occupy key positions. Although the Orbán government promised predictable policy making, it has often failed to come up with well-prepared proposals, as the university scholarship debate reform has recently shown (see BudaPost December 24). The announced war on corruption has also not been entirely successful (see BudaPost May 14), the liberal conservative blogger believes.  The current government, just like all previous governments, has shied away from cutting the benefits of pensioners, the blogger continues. As a final point, Véleményvezér remarks that the Orbán government has continued to protect the identity of agents and secret service personnel from the pre-1990 era, instead of fully disclosing secret service files (see BudaPost February 27).

Tags: corruption, Land, Orbán, pensions, tuition