Hungarian Prime Minister-elect Péter Magyar is keen to unlock more than €30 billion which Brussels has frozen due to rule-of-law concerns.
BUDAPEST — The European Commission is dispatching officials to Budapest to start negotiations with Hungarian Prime Minister-elect Péter Magyar on unblocking billions in EU funds for Hungary.
The Commission’s delegation will meet with Tisza party officials on Friday, Commission spokesperson Paula Pinho told POLITICO.
The meeting is set to take place five days after Péter Magyar ended Viktor Orbán’s 16-year rule in Sunday’s Hungarian election, and weeks before his new government is expected to take office. Orbán and his ministers are set to remain in power in a caretaker capacity until at least May 5.
Magyar’s landslide victory has given Tisza a supermajority in parliament, with which it can pass sweeping reforms aimed at restoring judicial independence, academic freedom and media pluralism, reversing years of democratic backsliding.
The prime minister-elect’s ultimate goal is to unlock more than €30 billion in EU funds that Brussels froze due to rule-of-law concerns. He is under particular pressure to release around €10 billion in Covid-19 recovery funds that expire at the end of August this year.
The Budapest meeting follows a phone call between Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and Magyar on Tuesday, where the two discussed “immediate priorities,” the commission chief said on X.
“There is swift work to be done to restore, realign and reform,” she wrote. “Restore the rule of law. Realign with our shared European values. And reform, to unlock the opportunities offered by European investments.”
After the call, Magyar said both had “agreed that unlocking the EU funds earmarked for the Hungarian people” and that “the Commission will work closely with us to meet the extremely tight deadline and deliver results.”
“The new government will take the key political decisions on how to unlock and invest these funds, in line with the clear mandate of the Hungarian people last Sunday,” he added.