HUNGARY: Opposition supporters rally to demand the resignation of Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany

Some 80,000 opposition supporters demonstrated outside Hungary's parliament on Friday (October 6) to demand Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany quit, just hours after he won a vote of confidence from lawmakers. Gyurcsany, who secured the votes of 207 MPs with 165 against, had told parliament he would not bow to opposition "blackmail" and vowed to stick to his tough economic programme. "[Shall we give in to blackmail] so to speak for the sake of peace and calm? What kind of peace and calm is achieved by breaching the constitutional democracy? Even if it's with the aim of creating a new order, it's the order of the minority, this is peace only for the moment, later a long period of no peace and instability would come," he said. Protesters from the opposition Fidesz party, many waving Hungarian flags, rallied in front of the neo-gothic parliament to the sound folk music and the national anthem, to demand he resign for lying about the economy to win April's election. But analysts said that despite rallies planned until the Oct. 23 anniversary of Hungary's failed uprising against Soviet rule, the opposition would not be able to oust the government. Earlier, Gyurcsany told parliament he would carry out plans to slash Hungary's budget deficit, the biggest in the European Union, by 2009, reducing the risk of a market crisis and bringing the country closer to euro membership. Gyurcsany once again apologised for the tone of his leaked comments, on a profanity-ridden tape, to a meeting with Socialist legislators in May, and for not being brave enough to tell the truth in the election campaign. Gyurcsany and his Socialist-led government campaigned on tax cuts but, after retaining power, introduced big tax rises to reduce a budget deficit which has ballooned to 10.1 percent of gross domestic product under Socialist rule since 2002. The budget deficit target for 2006 was 4.7 percent of GDP, using European Union accounting methodology, and despite the overshoots under the Socialists, investors believe Gyurcsany offers the only chance of tackling overspending. The forint rallied to 271.70 to the euro from 273.70 prior to the vote. The main opposition Fidesz party said the prime minister had not allowed people to vote in April based on the facts and this was shown by the tape, leaked on Sept. 17, in which he said "we lied in the morning, we lied in the evening" about the economy. That tape and tax rises and subsidy cuts have caused almost three weeks of protests outside parliament. At the rally, Orban delivered a lacklustre speech, asking people to sign a charter to restore moral order in the country and for them to come to parliament every day to protest. "If this goes on my dear friends, the thick and heavy fog of distrust will weigh on everything, the spider web of lies will cover everything, deceit will infect our country, weaken our communities and break our relationships," he said. Protesters, whose numbers were far lower than the hundreds of thousands Fidesz usually manages to put on the streets in rallies, said they would not give up.

ITN Source | October 7, 2006

Tags:. .shown. .sept. .closer. .achieved. .tackling