Karacsony: No place for corporate lobbyists in City Assembly

“It’s really appalling how politicians who purport to being opposition candidates want to send lobbyists linked to companies suspected of graft and cartel activity to the City Assembly,” the mayor wrote on Facebook, citing the example of Peter Magyar, whose newly formed conservative Tisza Party, he insisted, had placed a legal advisor of a company which faced cartel accusations under competition office proceedings second on its Budapest election list.

Karacsony also accused election rival David Vitezy, who is backed by the conservative green LMP party, of being linked to the manager of a car-sharing company owned by “an oligarch close to” the ruling Fidesz party, under investigation for corruption and money laundering. He added that the company had unsuccessfully lobbied the capital for regulations that served its own interests.

He called on Magyar and Vitezy to remove these people from their party election lists.

Vitezy responded as saying that the election list headed by Karacsony included 14th district mayor Csaba Horvath, “who himself was a suspect in two serious corruption cases”.

“To then criticise us for having the successful leader of a car-sharing company who has proven himself on the market on our list is precisely an example of the party political swamp Budapest needs to be freed from,” he said on Facebook.

The City Assembly needs experts who have proven themselves in their given field rather than politicians accused of crime, Vitezy said.