Orbán’s father offers building materials for a much higher price than the competition

Zöldi Blanka 2020.12.16. 1 Comment

Dolomit Kft. participates in state projects despite selling some of its products 60-70 percent more expensive than its main competitors.

„Read this! It’s crazy!” How the machine of crypto investment fraudsters works

Wirth Zsuzsanna 2020.12.03. 2 Comments

Fake news sites offering get-rich-quick opportunities lead people to criminals. The scammers trick Google and Facebook into promoting their offers.

“Don’t even try, sweetie, because I’m running out of patience” – We asked Viktor Orbán’s father about his involvement in state projects

Zöldi Blanka 2020.11.24. 2 Comments

The mining company of Hungarian PM’s father, Győző Orbán delivered building materials for major railway and road constructions, but he only wanted to talk about the beautiful autumn weather.

Opposition politician profited from business deals with the Hungarian government’s inner circles. Now, the EU has identified irregularities in several of their deals

Szabó András 2020.11.11.

Direkt36 reported that Gergő Czeglédy, a well-connected politician from the Hungarian Socialist Party, won lucrative state contracts jointly with government-close businessmen. Now OLAF, the EU’s anti-fraud agency found irregularities in some of their deals.

How sloppy coronavirus measures pushed healthcare workers to the brink of death

Wirth Zsuzsanna 2020.10.22.

12 hours in surgical masks, a lack of testing and a string of nurses falling ill. In May, coronavirus tread down a hospital in Western Hungary.

Secret battles of Orban’s rival – Budapest’s first year under opposition rule

Szabó András, Panyi Szabolcs, Pethő András 2020.10.19. 5 Comments

What conflicts emerged between Gergely Karácsony and Ferenc Gyurcsány? What did Antal Rogán tell the mayor? Who are the most influential people at Budapest’s city hall? Direkt36 presents the behind-the-scenes story of the capital’s opposition leadership.

Orban’s father was involved in controversial road construction

Zöldi Blanka, Pethő András 2020.09.23. 1 Comment

Not only the European Union, but also the Hungarian government criticized the project for being too expensive. This did not stop the mining company of the PM’s father to benefit from it.

Offshore company involved in suspicious transactions was protected by Hungarian bank, leaked secret files show

Pethő András, Zöldi Blanka 2020.09.21.

Suspicious transactions have been routinely moved through the Hungarian banking system, Direkt36 has revealed as part of the the global FinCENFiles investigation.

How Orban played Germany, Europe’s great power

Panyi Szabolcs 2020.09.18. 15 Comments

Why isn’t Germany tougher with the Hungarian government? Viktor Orbán has been building his alliances for decades through personal friendships, political gimmicks and pouring hundreds of billions of forints on German corporations. Direkt36 explored in detail the hidden history of Hungarian-German relations.

An internal document reveals a problematic real estate transaction financed by Hungary’s state bank

Szabó András 2020.09.09.

According to an internal document obtained by Direkt36 the state-owned Eximbank identified several risks related to a Budapest real estate development project. Nevertheless, it decided to financially support it with a loan worth millions of euros.

The government boasted about ventilator purchases, yet Hungary made the worst deals across the EU

Zöldi Blanka 2020.08.27.

Good Chinese relations didn’t bear fruit, as Hungary paid the highest price among all EU countries, international trade data show.

Iranian students expelled from Hungary during the pandemic may be able to return

Panyi Szabolcs 2020.07.15.

Criminal charges have been dropped against the majority of the Iranian students who were expelled from Hungary in the spring for violating quarantine rules, and the Hungarian authorities have also begun to revoke their expulsion orders.

It started as a simple patient transfer, but then it showed the chaos in the coronavirus fight

Wirth Zsuzsanna 2020.07.13. 2 Comments

In April, elderly patients were transferred between two Hungarian hospitals without testing. Thus, Covid-19 got into another institution.

Valuable archaeological treasures were demolished under a priority construction of the Hungarian government

Zöldi Blanka 2020.07.11.

During the reconstruction of the Buda Hospital, archaeological finds from Roman times were unearthed. Civil engineering works were done by the same company that will be responsible for groundworks related to the Paks nuclear power plant expansion.

Huawei is slowly pushed out from European 5G networks but the Orban government still supports them

Panyi Szabolcs 2020.07.03.

5G rollout has finally started in Hungary during the pandemic. Telenor, the partly state-owned mobile operator could be the lifeline for the beleaguered Chinese company.

“Mr. Russia” is now helping Viktor Orbán’s government to nurture German relations

Szabó András 2020.06.26.

Klaus Mangold, an influential German businessman with links to the European and Russian business elites has been advising the Orbán-government for many years. His consultancy contracts obtained by Direkt36 show that Mangold has been recently focusing on deepening Hungarian-German industrial relations.

Tens of thousands of forgotten Hungarians on the frontlines of the coronavirus

Tasnádi Kata, Panyi Szabolcs 2020.06.13. 3 Comments

While the conditions in nursing homes for elderly have become the number one political issue in Hungary, there has been little talk of homes for the disabled and psychiatric patients, or the social workers who provide care to them. Their problems are almost invisible.

Nuclear power plant Paks 2 rescheduled to favor the Russians

Szabó András 2020.06.09. 1 Comment

After two years of negotiations, the Hungarian government adopted during the epidemic an important legal modification related to the Paks nuclear expansion. From now on, the position of the Russians will be stronger and the Hungarian state will bear higher risks.

People close to Orban’s advisor appear in controversial Russia-connected megaproject

Szabó András 2020.05.15. 3 Comments

Preparations for a megaproject in which a Russian-Hungarian company will supply 1300 rail cars to Egypt seem to have accelerated. Simultaneously, people close to Arpad Habony, the PM’s chief advisor, and Zsolt Hernadi, CEO of MOL have appeared inside the firm which co-owns the winning company.

How the epidemic disrupted Orbán’s machinery

Szabó András 2020.05.06. 2 Comments

While in the past ten years the government seemed to operate with almost military-style discipline, the last few weeks brought several U-turns from the Orbán administration. Here’s what happened behind the scenes.