The former state secretary for culture, László L. Simon, was a guest of Emília Krug in the program “Beyond Színten túl”.
According to L. Simon the Saturday congress of Fidesz took place according to plan, only those who expected a more radical renewal could be disappointed. The so-called believers were confirmed by the event. He also said that those former Fidesz voters who voted for Tisza will not return to Fidesz even if they become disillusioned with the current government party. In his opinion, “politics and leadership should be changed” accordingly.
According to him, after the current period of “chaosing”, a moment will come when society will realistically assess the past 16 years and realize: “the country was transferred to the Tisza in a much better condition than the one in which Fidesz took it over at the time”. As the government commissioner responsible for the renovation of the Várkert Bazaar, he said that not only stadiums have been built in this country in the past period.
“Viktor Orbán has always been a leader who believed that public self-deprecation and admitting mistakes is actually a sign of weakness,” said L. Simon, when the Fidesz president gave a speech before the congress brochure the topic was diverted. According to him, Fidesz will not be marginalized, it still has support and a strong municipal base. He considers Orbán a tactician who is aware that he cannot become prime minister again.
L. Simon does not know why Fidesz went “off course”, i.e. why it started to become radicalized. He is used to the cultural milieu where you have to be in the middle. According to him, the concept of Fidesz’s will does not exist, “there is such a thing as Viktor Orbán’s concept”. According to the former secretary of state, Orbán may have been disappointed in the opposition again, as he was disappointed in 2002, and now especially in the Christian intelligentsia, but he personally sees that the party itself has turned away from this intelligentsia.
But according to L. Simon – who has not been a representative for five years – we should not be talking about the confrontation within Fidesz, but about “what is happening in the country”, what will happen to cultural life, the accession of Ukraine, EU funds, and so on. L. Simon hopes that the Hungarian Academy of Arts will remain.
He said that he sees that recently everyone blames Viktor Orbán for his public speaking style, but added that he is not the only one who communicates in this country. “In thirty-six years, he has not once said anything in parliament that would have insulted the other person’s dignity,” he said. He did not agree with Orbán’s bugging and László Kövér’s “Ungarische Péter” speech at the congress.
L. Simon did not know if there was a ban list in the public media, but if there was, then according to him, it was “not right”. He really wants to live in a country where “the pendulum doesn’t swing”. “Excuse me, but who is Cooky?” asked the former state secretary for culture when the presenter listed whom the state supported with public money, while several cultural organizations were not supported for political reasons.
He was disturbed by the fact that the composition of the intellectual meetings in Kötcs had changed, that even in 2010 there was a different atmosphere at the Fidesz results waiting rooms. According to him, those “who played a major role in intellectual life” could be counted on one hand at the 2026 results. He was out at the festive book week, where he spoke to several artists and writers with bourgeois values, who are “immeasurably disappointed” and cannot be addressed by Fidesz’s current line-up. According to him, the created political vacuum will appeal to them, and according to him, sooner or later there will be such a force or party in Hungary.
“I’m currently working on things like organizing the Tokaj Writers’ Camp, come along”
– he said when Balázs Németh’s parliamentary gossip came up.
According to L. Simon, the defeat of Fidesz was not only due to communication. In place of the prime minister, he would have acted much more seriously in the case of the scandal surrounding the Hungarian National Bank, “it would have brought measurable results both politically and in terms of percentages”. According to him, it is a problem that corruption cases always arise again and again. It doesn’t matter what kind of government there is, if someone is accused of corruption, action must be taken.
Krisztián Grecsó referred to a writer in his previous broadcast of Beyond the Színtas the one with whom he started from the same place, “from a sublet hole, and now he owns half of Fejér county and a winery”. Then L. Simon asked the presenter if he knew how big Fejér county was, how big a hectare was, and then he said that the size of the property he and his wife bought on credit and partially inherited did not reach four hundred hectares, roughly a third of the size of an average farm. “Envy, that’s what it’s called,” he added.
“You could say I live my life in the spirit of the Max Weberian Protestant ethic,” he said, adding that he has no harmful passions aside from fine dining and workaholism. His conscience is clear, he has not provided anyone with illegal tender sources. “If we also look at liquidity, I have to say that the middle-class lifestyle is what characterizes our life,” he said.
L. Simon also added to Grecsó that “he should be very ashamed”, because according to him, he was never sold on a mat, he never said anything bad about him, he never hurt him, he never wrote a negative sentence about him, while he “has been kicking me for many years”. According to L. Simon, he never harmed Grecsó’s career, did not hinder his career, recognized him as a writer.
“To make baseless accusations (…) is not worthy of a dedicated writer”
he said.
Grecso is absolutely right in that there are awarded and non-awarded prizes that cannot be repaired afterwards. According to him, Nádasdy deserved the Kossuth award, and he regrets that he died without the award, but there are others who were in a similar situation.
You can watch the full conversation here:
