By SL
Published on
Hungary’s ruling Fidesz party has postponed a parliamentary debate and vote on a controversial bill aiming to limit foreign funding of media organisations and NGOs, the party’s parliamentary leader has said.
A lawmaker in Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s party last month filed a draft law entitled “Transparency in Public Life” that would allow the government to monitor, restrict, penalise and ban media outlets and NGOs it deems a threat to the country’s sovereignty.
The draft legislation has sparked mass street protests, criticism from rights groups and warnings from the European Commission and the Council of Europe. The Commission last month demanded that the draft law be withdrawn from the legislative process.
The bill, which has been compared to Russia’s “foreign agent” law, was originally set to be voted on in mid-June and was expected to pass as Fidesz holds a two-thirds majority.
However, Fidesz’s parliamentary Máté Kocsis said that there was debate within the party over which “legal instruments must be used to protect sovereignty” under the legislation.
The draft law had received many proposals in recent weeks, including from the Hungarian Banking Association, the Hungarian Advertising Association, the Office of the President of the Republic, the Hungarian Bar Association and the Hungarian Association of Newspaper Publishers, according to Kocsis.
“No decision will be made on the matter before the summer. Parliament will not vote on it,” he said.
Hungary under Orbán has for years enacted crackdowns on NGOs and independent media, passing laws that critics argue seek to stigmatise and hinder groups that provide protection for women and minorities, offer legal and human rights assistance, and expose official corruption.
Those efforts ramped up in 2023 when Orbán’s right-wing populist government launched the Sovereignty Protection Office, an authority tasked with investigating organisations and media outlets it deems to be exerting foreign influence.
Orbán, who polls show faces the biggest challenge yet to his power in elections set to take place next year, has claimed that foreign interests — primarily originating in the US and in neighbouring Ukraine — have sought to use independent media outlets and anti-corruption watchdogs in Hungary to influence public opinion with the aim of toppling him.
Such organisations have strongly denied such claims, and argued that the work they perform is done to professional standards and in the public interest.
The bill introduced last month outlines a broad definition of what constitutes a threat to sovereignty.
Organisations could be targeted if they oppose or negatively portray values such as Hungary’s democratic character, national unity, traditional family structures, or Christian culture — suggesting that even legitimate criticism of government policy could be treated as a national security threat.