The disinformation spread by public service media in Hungary during Viktor Orbán’s 16-year rule was of a kind unique in the European Union.
No other public service media in the EU in recent decades has published lies, hatred and propaganda on this scale.
Some of the material was reminiscent of fascist, anti-Semitic propaganda of the period between the two world wars; Other content was similar to the output of Russian state media.
To give a few examples: criminal Arab and African immigrants who rape helpless Hungarian girls; an American billionaire of Jewish Hungarian descent who is destroying Hungary’s Christian identity; Children are being indoctrinated by the European Union into “LGBTQ propaganda”; A Ukrainian mafia state that wants to sacrifice Hungary’s young generation in the war and rob millions of Hungarian pensioners.
beginning of a new chapter
But that era is over now.
At 4 pm on Tuesday, news channel M1 broadcast a black screen with the following message: “Public media should not lie. We are sorry for having to do this for so long. Public media will now be reformed so that they are independent and trustworthy. Our news service is currently suspended. Stay tuned!”
All news bulletins and political programs broadcast by Hungarian public television and radio channels were replaced with the same apology/announcement.
Only the website of news agency MTI, also part of public media holding MTVA, continued to post political news.
‘They used to sing at night; He lied during the day’
This is a historic moment for Hungary.
Nothing like this had ever happened before on the country’s public broadcaster – not even when the communist dictatorship collapsed in 1989/90 and Hungary began to transition to democracy.
“A historic day. Today marks the end of propaganda broadcasting on public media platforms,” Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar posted on Facebook on Tuesday. He wrote, “They lied at night, they lied by day, they lied on every wavelength. It’s over now.”
But there’s more to this change than just a black screen and a written apology.
M1’s most senior figures have been removed from their posts. Among these are M1’s director, Zsolt Németh (nicknamed “Pitbull” for his highly aggressive, confrontational style), and most of M1’s programming directors and senior news editors.
Symbolic time of relaunch
Exactly four hours after the black screen appeared, M1 resumed broadcasting at exactly 7:56
The choice of time (19:56 CET) was not a coincidence. This was an allusion to the anti-communist, anti-Soviet revolution of 1956 which was brutally crushed by Soviet troops.
The choice of film that followed was also highly symbolic: “The Witness” is a 1979 Hungarian classic, a political satire about the horrors of Stalinism in Hungary and its absurd propaganda.
The black screen with the apology is still visible on the website of M1’s main news program Hirado.
keeping election promises
An overhaul of Hungary’s public service media system was one of Peter Magyar’s central campaign promises ahead of the elections on 12 April.
Even after his Tisza party’s historic landslide victory, hardly a day went by without Magyar attacking public service broadcasters, calling them “factories of lies”.
And for good reason, too: the story of how his predecessor, Viktor Orban, reshaped Hungary’s public-service media – and indeed most of the country’s privately owned media – and toeed them to the government line, is one of the darkest chapters of his rule.
Shortly after his electoral victory in the spring of 2010, Orbán’s government changed Hungary’s media law, creating the National Media and Information Communications Authority (NMHH) and staffing key regulatory bodies with pro-government figures. Public service media were later brought under tighter central control and consolidated within the MTVA holding company.
In 2011, most freelance journalists were either dismissed from public media outlets or left voluntarily.
No balanced reporting
From that point on, the “public service media” label was little more than a formality.
Over the past few years, MTVA’s outlets have increasingly transformed into a mouthpiece that constantly repeats Orbán’s propaganda like a mantra.
In its news and political programs, M1 railed against the European Union, American billionaire investor and philanthropist George Soros, civil society organizations, and independent journalists.
Despite the legal obligation to provide balanced reporting, opposition politicians and independent voices virtually disappeared from MTVA channels.
Following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, MTVA channels escalated their rhetoric even more. In a stunning reversal of victim and aggressor, they created a parallel reality in which Ukraine was portrayed as a kind of evil empire and sometimes unfiltered repeated Russian state propaganda.
Orban and Hungary’s private media
Orbán adopted a similar strategy with Hungary’s private media.
Companies controlled by government-aligned oligarchs bought private media outlets and either brought them into line or closed them down entirely, as happened with the left-liberal daily Nepzabadsag In 2016.
Then, on November 28, 2018, Hungarian businessmen close to Orbán “donated” their media assets to the recently established Central European Press and Media Foundation (KESMA). It was a collective “gift” with nothing given or paid in return.
In total, more than 476 broadcast, print and online media outlets were transferred to KESMA, covering almost the entire pro-government private media sector in Hungary.
what happens next?
Last week a transitional director was appointed at MTVA media holding company. On Tuesday, that director named an interim leadership team for the M1 news channel.
In a statement, MTVA said that permanent leadership positions within the holding company will be filled in a public selection process conducted in consultation with social and professional organizations.
Many independent journalists have welcomed the changes in Hungary’s media landscape, but they are also demanding genuine participation in the reform process and awaiting detailed details of the government’s plans.
The plan is to include three representatives each from the government majority, the parliamentary opposition and independent journalists’ unions on the supervisory board of a newly reorganized media holding company.
Viktor Orbán on Tuesday protested the restructuring of public service media on Facebook, calling it “a new step in the tyranny of the Tisza party.”
There was also criticism from opposition lawmaker Balaszs Nemeth. This is ironic because Nemeth was Hirado’s former news anchor and therefore involved in many of the program’s most infamous low points. After the M1 screen went black on Tuesday, Németh wrote on Facebook: “Hungarian democracy is dead.”
This article was originally published in German.