The Danube Institute is funded by Batthyány Lajos Foundation (BLA), which Orbán repurposed from an existing organisation and gave the unusual status of a publicly managed body governed by private individuals, placing it outside ordinary treasury oversight.
The specifics of what fellows are paid – and what they are required to produce – became public through contract documents obtained by investigative outlet Átlátszó after a protracted legal battle. The Institute’s payments to visiting scholars and guest speakers more than tripled in under three years: from €197,000 in 2022 to €730,000 in the first ten months of 2024.
The contracts are explicit about deliverables. Fellows are required to give speeches, attend events, network, and place articles in Western outlets. The UK publications specifically named as placement targets: GB News, The Spectator, The Critic and UnHerd.
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The sums involved are remarkable. Founded in 1996 as a modest educational institution for talented Hungarian students, MCC was significantly enlarged in 2020 when Hungary’s Fidesz-majority National Assembly transferred to it 10% stakes in two of Hungary’s largest companies – energy firm MOL and drugmaker Gedeon Richter – along with $462 million in cash and $9 million worth of property. The combined endowment was valued at a whopping $1.7 billion: nearly 1% of Hungary’s Gross Domestic Product.
Much of this cash comes from Russian oil. MOL sources approximately 65% of its crude from Russia. According to an investigation by German broadcaster ZDF, MCC received around €50 million in MOL dividends alone in one recent year.
https://democracyforsale.substack.com/p/orbans-britsThe irony is that the right wing, in Hungary and the USA, has for years been painted George Soros as bankrolling interference in various countries' politics, while it's actually been the Hungarian state doing that.
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