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 Motorways
leading out of the capital were choked on the morning of 23 October as
thousands of Budapesters chose to spends the long weekend in the quiet of the
countryside. The annual holiday commemorating the first day of Hungary’s
doomed Uprising against Soviet-backed rule was once a celebration of Hungarian
unity. Now, after rioting has broken out in Budapest
on two consecutive years, it is as much a symbol of the bitter political
divisions in Hungary.
Official ceremonies (above), attended by Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány last
Thursday took place behind heavily guarded police barricades. Only invited
dignitaries and accredited members of the press were allowed anywhere near
Kossuth tér in front of Parliament as the Hungarian flag was raised amid chill
winds and drizzle.
The same
atmosphere prevailed at the solemn laying of wreaths at the memorial to 1956
across town on 56-osok tere (Fifty-sixers’ Square).
Politically sensitive
The
centre-right opposition party Fidesz refuses to have anything to do with any
official ceremonies involving the governing Hungarian Socialist Party, which it
characterises as the successors to the pre-1989 Communist party. At a rally
held in the Castle District at 3pm, party leader Viktor Orbán spoke under
lowering skies of the need once again to “release the spirit of Hungarian
freedom from the bottle”, as Hungarians had united in doing in 1956. Orbán
berated the government, saying it is incapable of dealing with the current
economic situation and is making the problem worse day by day. 
A spokesman
for the Hungarian Socialist Party later accused Orbán of using the occasion to
foment social unrest. “For Viktor Orbán, the national summit [on the economic
crisis] and the national holiday are simply an opportunity to throw mud at his
political enemies, and to rouse passions with lies,” said István Nyakó.
After the
wreath-laying ceremony, Gyurcsány spoke at the inauguration of a new Imre Nagy
Memorial House, in the former residence of the reform Communist leader. Nagy
became the reluctant figurehead of the Uprising after Moscow’s
placeman Ferenc Rákosi was ousted, only to be executed in 1958 after the Soviet Union had restored its grip on the country.
Gyurcsány later placed a wreath at the symbolic plot 301 in Rákoskeresztur
cemetery, where numerous heroes of the 1956 Uprising are buried, and Nagy was
symbolically reinterred in 1989.
“Imre Nagy
was able to bring people together in a free Hungary despite being a left-wing
politician. The Hungarian left can only conduct itself properly as long as it
never thinks of Imre Nagy as is its own, since the politician belongs to
everybody,” said Gyurcsány,
Several
gatherings of extreme right-wing organisations were among the 39 officially
registered public gatherings last Thursday. The Movement for a Better Hungary
(Jobbik) held a demonstration on Deák tér in the centre of Budapest, while on Hosök tere (Heroes’
Square) the old guard of post-communist Hungarian nationalism, the Hungarian
Justice and Life Party (MIÉP) held their own rally.
The extreme right
The
controversial uniformed Magyar Gárda (Hungarian Guard) were present at an
afternoon rally in front of the Corvin cinema, the site of some of the most
famous battles against Soviet tanks which rolled in to suppress the revolution
on 4 November 1956.
The
well-known extreme right-wing activists György Budaházy and László Toroczkai
called a demonstration in front of the police headquarters. The two have been
at the centre of several outbursts of violence since the riots that broke out
in September 2006. The unrest flared up after a recording of Prime Minister
Ferenc Gyurcsány acknowledging that he and his party had lied to secure
re-election was leaked just as a drastic austerity package had begun to bite.
Shortly
after 7pm last Thursday, some 200 masked youths, chanting the now-familiar
down-with-the-government slogans, some carrying flaming torches, began to march
the 4km or so from the police headquarters to Astoria
in central Pest. By 8.25pm the police had closed
the group into Markó utca in District V, refusing to allow them to move onto
Bajcsy Zsilinszky utca. The street would lead them in the direction of the
Opera House, where Gyurcsány is one of the guests of honour at a gala evening.
Prompt arrests
During the
course of the day, at least 17 arrests were made, and knives, a starting pistol
and a can of petrol were among the items found on suspects subjected to spot
checks. The police rigidly employed a tactic, previously announced, of
immediately arresting anyone who tried to provoke or attack them. One youth
pulled from the crowd was, it transpired, already known to the police for
having bombarded Microsoft boss Steve Ballmer with eggs during his visit to Budapest in May. At close
to 9pm, Budaházy was pulled from the crowd and taken into custody, causing an
outcry among the demonstrators.
At around
9.30pm, by which time the demonstrators
had largely dispersed when reports circulated that the police received an
anonymous bomb warning by telephone. At 9.50pm the police reported that three
petrol-based explosive devices with a timer had been discovered in the boot of
a car parked under a flyover near Nyugati railway station. One arrest was made in connection with the case.
As the
night wore on, small groups of demonstrators were reportedly loitering on and
around Deák tér and Astoria in the centre of Pest. They were massively outnumbered by police in riot
gear, backed up with water cannons. As of 10pm, the ambulance services had
reported no cases of injuries connected to any of the 23 October events.
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