The state dinner in Ottawa on Oct. 4 has been cancelled. So has the event at the Empire Club scheduled for Oct. 5. Hungary's indefatigable President, Laszlo Solyom, is otherwise engaged. With people on the march in the streets of Budapest, this isn't the time to be sitting at head tables, exchanging pleasantries with dignitaries such as the Hungarian-born Peter Munk, whose Centre for International Studies has just opened an exhibition called Hungarian Exodus, as well as a four-day conference on how a rebellious people made history in 1956.
It seems the grandchildren of the original freedom fighters are flirting with the idea of making history again. Maybe it's in the blood. Hungarians feel the best way to commemorate the 50th anniversary of their uprising is -- by rising up.
October was to be a month to celebrate an event of half a century ago, perhaps even more momentous in retrospect than it appeared at the time. Although the Soviet empire survived the revolution in Hungary by some 35 years, when Stalin's statue came crashing to the pavement on that long-ago October evening in Budapest, it signalled the beginning of the end.
But although the evil empire was gone, its spirit wasn't entirely extinguished. Communist zombies started lurching back into public life throughout Eastern Europe. Somewhat chastened but essentially unrepentant, they disguised themselves as "socialists," though some picked up enough Capitalism 101 to make themselves millionaires. Once elected, they proceeded to feather their nests and run their countries into the ground.
This happened in Hungary in 2002, when Viktor Orban's centre-right government was narrowly defeated by the ex-communist snitch (badge no. D-209) Peter Medgyessy, who, after doing an admirable amount of damage in only two years, was replaced as prime minister by an erstwhile leader of the Young Communist League -- and a post-communist millionaire -- named Ferenc Gyurcsanyi. Mr. Gyurcsanyi achieved a historic first: he led his incumbent government to a narrow electoral victory in April this year. No Hungarian government had managed to do that since the collapse of communism 16 years ago.
The ex-communist millionaire must have done something right, you say? Yes, he did. He lied. He lied better than anyone else.
This assessment comes from Mr. Gyurcsanyi himself, who at a meeting in May told his caucus in no uncertain terms that their Socialist party, having achieved nothing after four years in power, owed its electoral success to having lied "from sunrise to sunset." The party probably lied after sunset, too, which is what the people of Hungary assumed when the prime minister's taped confession was leaked to the public about four months later. On Sept. 18 street protests erupted in Budapest. Rioters occupied the ground floor of the TV building -- shades of 1956! -- and proceeded to wreck some police vehicles outside.
The uprising of 2006 has been low-grade, so far. The demonstrations calling for Mr. Gyurcsanyi's resignation continue. Some peaceful, some violent, they've caused moderate property damage and injured about 150 people.
Hungarians seem divided about the affair. "What's happening here is terrible but not serious," writes a Budapest intellectual in a private letter to a Toronto friend. "It's a marriage of soccer hooligans and the far right, coupled with a weak government's impotence -- like Germany in 1930." This is, of course, a man of the left speaking. A Budapest broadcast journalist has a different view. "We try to stand fast and demonstrate," writes M.K., also in a private letter, "but all power is on the other side. At least we'll die on our feet."
Unlikely. Ready as some of the children and grandchildren of 1956 may be to make history, history doesn't seem ready to be made in 2006. The constellations are all wrong for a revolution. Chances are the matter will be decided at tomorrow's municipal elections, which in Hungary are conducted along party lines. The voters may hand Mr. Gyurcsanyi such a stinging rebuke that he'll have to resign, though if Budapest's socialist mayor, Gabor Demszky, manages to hang on to power, a rebuke by rustics in the boonies won't carry the day. So far, Mr. Demszky is leading in the polls.
© 2006 George Jonas
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