By Tamas Csonka in Budapest
A former tax investigator of the Hungarian Tax Office (NAV) says that high-level political orders led to the halt of an investigation against a prominent businessman, who months later established an alleged spoiler political party to further divide the opposition in the 2022 general elections.
Opposition parties say the case exposes the inner workings of the Orban regime and how the government intervenes directly in the work of investigative bodies to undermine the rule of law.
The investigation against Gyorgy Gattyan was unexpectedly terminated in the autumn of 2021 despite being close to prosecution, Lajos Tiszolczi told Hungary’s leading online political news channel Partizan on June 17.
Gattyan, who was recently ranked as Hungary’s fifth-wealthiest person with a net worth of €1bn, had a tax debt of HUF20bn (€50mn).
In the interview, the former tax official said that he learned from at least two separate sources that three people with very close government connections intervened in favour of Gattyan, who had for years fought the tax office in court after his assets were frozen in Hungary when he was ordered to pay tens of billions of tax debts. The businessman relocated much of his businesses to Luxembourg in the mid-2010s, but he continued to challenge the tax office in court.
Tiszolczi and others working on the case were sidelined before the case was finally closed.
A few months later, Gattyan announced the launch of a new political movement, Megoldas Mozgalom (Solution Movement) running on a quasi-centrist platform with a focus on boosting digitalisation in Hungary, allegedly to lure undecided voters away from opposition parties.
Polls at the end of 2021 suggested a tight race ahead of the 2022 general elections, as the opposition ran on a joint ticket against the incumbent conservative nationalists for the first time. A number of bogus parties popped up before the election to distract voters, but unlike small, fringe parties, Megoldas Mozgalom put significant amounts of funding into its campaign.
The ruling party also unleashed an unprecedented pre-election spending splurge, including the refund of personal income tax to families and the payment of the 13-month payments to secure its victory.
Fidesz seemed to have overestimated the threat posed by the joint opposition, as it won by the biggest margin since first sweeping to power with a two-third majority in 2010. Gatttyan's fringe party barely passed the 1% threshold, which meant it did not have to reimburse hundreds of millions of campaign money.
The former NAV official also recalled that Finance Minister Mihaly Varga dismissed high-ranking NAV officials in the summer of 2021, including the head of the tax authority.
After leaving NAV, Tiszolczi applied for a job at the Integrity Authority, the anti-fraud body tasked with overseeing EU funds set up by the government in late 2022 to meet demands set by Brussels to access locked development funds. The job post was withdrawn and he was told informally that he posed a risk to national security.
After the publication of the interview, the party chairman of Megoldas Mozgalom tendered his resignation and journalists working at a small online news site, financed by Gattyan, were dismissed.
The businessman is also involved as a financier of Teqball, invented by members of Gattyan's party. It combines the elements of football and table tennis, played on a special curved table. Teqball is gaining popularity worldwide and is even aiming for inclusion in the Olympics. Gattyan had secured state grants to help the expansion of the innovation abroad.
