Published: 22 March 2013
Region: UK
The Hungarian government awarded TV presenter, Ferenc Szaniszlo, with a prestigious journalism prize, even though he has been accused of anti-Roma and anti-Semitic comments.
The decision of the right-wing Fidesz party was strongly criticised and within hours of the prize announcement, Minister for Human Resources Zoltan Balog apologised for what he called “a bad decision”.
The Hungarian minister said he had been unable to check the background of the several hundred people to whom he awarded state honours. He also sent a letter to the journalist calling on him to give the prize back as it was awarded “in error”.
After the outcry, the journalist has decided to give back The Mihaly Tancsics prize, named after a prominent 19th Century journalist, and awarded each year on Hungary’s national day, 15 March.
At least a dozen former recipients of the prize had returned their awards in protest and Israeli Ambassador Ilan Mor said the prize had been given to “the wrong person for the very wrong reasons”.
Two comments of the TV presenter, who works at the pro-government private Echo TV, have been the focus of the critics.
In 2011, Echo TV was fined £2000 by the Media Authority when Mr Szaniszlo likened Roma to monkeys people.
In 2009, the Hungarian reporter suggested that Israel might have to be emptied by 2020 as it had lost its strategic importance in the Middle East. He added, “But who would want six million Israelis?”
The Fidesz Party had been criticised in the past as Zsolt Bayer, a Fidesz co-founder, told a right-wing Hungarian newspaper that “a significant part of the Roma is unfit for coexistence. They are not fit to live among people. These Roma are animals and they behave like animals”, reports BBC.
