The oppression of Hungarian protesters in the shadow of 1956
Luke Janes | 25.10.2006 18:42 | Indymedia | Repression | Social Struggles | World
Outlines and gives background on the October 23, 2006 protests in Budapest, Hungary from the front lines, which is a very different picture than that which is posed by the international media. Protests involved tens of thousands of people around the country who have been demonstrating since September 18th in response to discovering major lies from the majority party.
Budapest, Hungary. 2006.10.23. 12:30 P.M.
Last night protesters participating for over a month in a registered sit-in on the parliament square were asked to briefly leave so that the police could clear the area of potential weapons. The protesters were told that they would be let in by single file line within an hour. They weren't.
Instead, about a minute after the majority of protesters were free of the square, roughly 2000 riot-guard police arrived at the scene and forced the 500 protesters into a narrow street where they pushed the protesters along, away from the square, for at least 15 blocks. I was one of the few protesters who eventually was able to return to the square after the forced exodus and confinement. Upon return, we were greeted by jeering from the police line, who informed us that the square was now off-limits, including all our tents, food, equipment, blankets, and personal valuables that we had left inside in anticipation for our quick return.
Many who could return home did, but those who were depending on their materials inside the square had no option but to wait around outside the police line. Even the sight of the cold and tired protesters was unacceptable to the police. We were pushed away violently in a series of expansions of the police line -- who at one point even cleared out a cafe where some of the protesters had been gathering to get warm and watch the news. We felt as if we were being dispersed by any means -- be they lies or violence.
This demonstration was one of many all over the country, at times reaching 20,000 in Budapest alone—a number that has diminished little since they began on September 18th when a the tape of a closed meeting was leaked to the international media. In the tape, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Gyurcsany, admitted that his party had made sweeping lies to the people about the horrible state of the Hungarian economy in order to get re-elected.
In a democratic nation, what we would naturally expect to follow from such a deep and overwhelming scandal is a series of impeachments, resignations, and perhaps re-elections. Not so in Hungary.
Instead, a mock "vote of confidence" was cast among parliament members, a vote which fell entirely among political lines. The Prime Minister's party, being in the majority, was thereby granted the confidence of the "Hungarian people."
And HirTV, the only Hungarian channel to cover the September 18th violence, has recently faced 500,000 (USD) fine from the Hungarian media watchdog who claimed they "attempted to present the incidents as revolutionary events, and spoke of a new '56."
There is a great sense of irony here. For as I write this, on television is the very same square where hundreds of people were deceitfully and violently expelled only hours before. In our place is the civilized government commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Revolution. The wake of our tents, signs, and flags are carefully off camera, as are any citizens.
This is the very same 1956 Revolution where thousands of protesters and hopeful freedom fighters were murdered in the fight for independence from Soviet oppression. Independence that was supposed to have finally been realized in 1989 by Hungary. Independence never fully realized, because many of the current Hungarian political elite are the heirs of Soviet Communism. And because the current Hungarian constitution is essentially the same one that the Soviets forced upon the Hungarians in the first place. To complete the circle, this is the very same constitution that does not give the Hungarian people any method to impeach their lying leaders. Thus, the leaking of the Prime Minister's musings have since sparked unremitting nation-wide protests.
Because of the media's characterizations of the protesters as "football hooligans," "homeless drunkards," and "Nazis," it is important to get an alternative description of who these people really are. Though this uprising has not been without hooligans, most people in the demonstration are deeply committed to a more peaceful and democratic Hungary and act accordingly. Popular sentiment ranges the continuum between feeling that the Prime Minister should resign, and feeling that the Soviet constitution should be replaced by one created by Hungarians, for Hungary. Participants range in age from children to people who had actually been part of the 1956 Revolution. They, by a great majority, were peaceful and spiritual demonstrators who simply wished through signs, chants, candles, time, and the media, to reach the Hungarian people with their desire for a more honest, democratic, and Hungarian Hungary.
But demonstrators in Budapest have been welcomed only by a series of broken agreements culminating in violence from the Hungarian police. First they were convinced to peacefully "share" the square with the government during the commemoration. In exchange the police promised to let free the various citizens who were imprisoned during the September 18th conflict between protesters, "football hooligans," and police, a promise which has yet to have been met by the police. Neither were they allowed any part of the square, as we have seen in the deceitful and forceful expulsion of demonstrators last night.
And all of this was possible because of something that was noticeably absent through the entire night: the media.
The police and the government knew they could get away with it without anyone noticing, so they did it. And because the protests of 2006 were silenced, we can all sit back and watch the carefully cropped scenes ironically commemorating the protests of 1956, and feel that Hungary is a stable democracy, ready for the loving arms of the EU and the Euro.
But in order for Democracy to function, there must be honesty, and there must be a free press. In Hungary, there is neither.
Even as I write, this story continues to develop. Although there have been road blocks keeping the Hungarian country people out of the capital on this proud day, protesters from within the city are re-gathering in the thousands. We will have to see what the media and police does with them.
________________________
2006.10.23 8:30 P.M.
I have now witnessed a war zone. Can it only have been eight hours? Rubber bullets flying in all directions, towards children and the elderly. Hundreds of tear gas bombs streaming across the sky like rockets, sometimes hitting protesters, tearing flesh here and there. Blood. A man's open face. Protesters hurling rocks from within the clouds of burning tear gas and gunshots. Over a hundred injured. Explosions echoing through the city's old buildings which have known them before. Young protesters pushing 6-foot-tall numbers and letters into the front lines. Read them now: A-S-U-B, 6-9-5-1. From within the chaos a moment of realization: "SZABADSZAG" (FREEDOM), "1956." They are hiding behind them now, so as not to be shot. They are holding the 1956 line. They are tossing stones against bullet proof armor, shields, riot tanks that spray strange streams of painted liquid. Rushing blues and spurting greens, smoky whites.
One group pushes an old Soviet truck into the fray that had been on display in a park nearby. It comes to a rest on the front line, with the letters, useless except as cover and symbolism. They shroud it in an enormous flag whose center has been torn out – the only way to remove the 1956 Soviet symbol from the once pure Hungarian flag of Red, White, and Green. Another group pushes an old Soviet cannon into the square. It sits there, shooting symbols and blocking bullets and gas bombs. Finally, a group somehow manages to hijack a Soviet tank on display in the same park. The engine lets out an old rumble, as if it hasn't been woken in decades, and belches out plumes of white smoke that blend with the tear gas. The tank, DRIVES. There is this tremendous moment of tragic, absurd, triumph. Torn flags waving, the tank jerks and grinds towards the front, its cannon merely a pen writing metaphors in the smoke. Chaos. Madness. Terror. Pride. Most people are watchers from the side -- in awe, disbelief, shame, anger, daze, panic. Eyes red and teared. And I realize – we are suffering, but we stay. We come back for more. We stay. We stay.
Then the terrible ending. We are cornered into a funnel alley. The tear gas is flying. The front joins the watchers in retreat. And all of a sudden, we are trapped. Unable to escape, hardly able to move as we squeeze into this alley and away. People panicking. Tear gas flying over us, into us, in front of us, mace spray and clubs behind us. Terror, claustrophobia, no breath, no escape. Tear gas burning the lungs. A stumbling mass, blind, helpless. We have had enough.
Or so it seems.
As I write this, I see and hear that the people will not go home. The gathering continues, and so too does the violence. They will not go home. Is this possible? What is this mad courage that will not stop? Is it, could it be, that they really care? That they mean to get the changes they feel are needed? That they are willing to risk their lives for it?
- - -
I've had another look at how the local media are presenting the story, and I feel the need to clarify here, again. The media have shown photos of weapons that the police found on the premises of the square as they were searching it. Presumably, this is meant to paint the protesters as something akin to terrorists, justifying the violent and deceitful treatment they were given by the police. There is a lot to say about this. But mainly, I wonder how it is possible that the police knew of these weapons after only having been in the square for about a minute, when they pushed us off down alleys and far away. Or was it never their intention to let us back into the square?
Regardless, is it surprising that they found potential weapons at a campsite of 100 people? Knives are for preparing food. Axes are for chopping wood. Hammers are for beating stakes. What the media fails to mention is that these are the "weapons" that we deliberately and carefully left behind for them to confiscate. We even sorted them into piles! The bottom line is – they set us up, and we bought it, and the media played into their hand.
- - -
As I write now they still have yet to let us enter to retrieve our belongings in the square. For me, this means my tent and sleeping bag. I wonder if I will have to spend another night without sleep or warmth. I wonder how long this can go on before something gives. Will it be the people, or the government?
_________________________________
2006.10.24 10:00 P.M.
The demonstrations have ended, for now. The police broke up the last main gathering around two in the morning, 24 hours after the police first expelled the initial demonstrators from the square. We had been waiting for the farmers union which was to come with agricultural vehicles to support the demonstration, but they did not come in time. They say they will come starting the 2nd of next month. The October 23 day of remembrance has come and gone. But it is not over.
Since then, police levels in Budapest have remained high, breaking up "crowds" as small as ten people all over the city, making it impossible for people to gather. When one man was asked if he was going to continue protesting, he responded, "I feel I
am protesting wherever I am, whatever i do, by just existing."
Back in the square, the next morning, government workers can be seen across the fence taking down the people's tents and stuffing them into numbered bags. I have my embassy speak with the police chief. They are collecting the people's goods to "catalog them and have a media release of the contents." I wonder whether their decision was rather an attempt to deal another blow to the registered sit-in that was to continue in front of Parliament.
From the top, politicians do their writing of history. The "socialist" party blames the opposition party for inciting demonstrators. The opposition party blames the "socialist" Prime Minister for not resigning. Nobody seems to blame the police, or the constitution, or the corrupt and hypocritical parties.
But it is not over.
Last night protesters participating for over a month in a registered sit-in on the parliament square were asked to briefly leave so that the police could clear the area of potential weapons. The protesters were told that they would be let in by single file line within an hour. They weren't.
Instead, about a minute after the majority of protesters were free of the square, roughly 2000 riot-guard police arrived at the scene and forced the 500 protesters into a narrow street where they pushed the protesters along, away from the square, for at least 15 blocks. I was one of the few protesters who eventually was able to return to the square after the forced exodus and confinement. Upon return, we were greeted by jeering from the police line, who informed us that the square was now off-limits, including all our tents, food, equipment, blankets, and personal valuables that we had left inside in anticipation for our quick return.
Many who could return home did, but those who were depending on their materials inside the square had no option but to wait around outside the police line. Even the sight of the cold and tired protesters was unacceptable to the police. We were pushed away violently in a series of expansions of the police line -- who at one point even cleared out a cafe where some of the protesters had been gathering to get warm and watch the news. We felt as if we were being dispersed by any means -- be they lies or violence.
This demonstration was one of many all over the country, at times reaching 20,000 in Budapest alone—a number that has diminished little since they began on September 18th when a the tape of a closed meeting was leaked to the international media. In the tape, the Hungarian Prime Minister, Gyurcsany, admitted that his party had made sweeping lies to the people about the horrible state of the Hungarian economy in order to get re-elected.
In a democratic nation, what we would naturally expect to follow from such a deep and overwhelming scandal is a series of impeachments, resignations, and perhaps re-elections. Not so in Hungary.
Instead, a mock "vote of confidence" was cast among parliament members, a vote which fell entirely among political lines. The Prime Minister's party, being in the majority, was thereby granted the confidence of the "Hungarian people."
And HirTV, the only Hungarian channel to cover the September 18th violence, has recently faced 500,000 (USD) fine from the Hungarian media watchdog who claimed they "attempted to present the incidents as revolutionary events, and spoke of a new '56."
There is a great sense of irony here. For as I write this, on television is the very same square where hundreds of people were deceitfully and violently expelled only hours before. In our place is the civilized government commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the 1956 Revolution. The wake of our tents, signs, and flags are carefully off camera, as are any citizens.
This is the very same 1956 Revolution where thousands of protesters and hopeful freedom fighters were murdered in the fight for independence from Soviet oppression. Independence that was supposed to have finally been realized in 1989 by Hungary. Independence never fully realized, because many of the current Hungarian political elite are the heirs of Soviet Communism. And because the current Hungarian constitution is essentially the same one that the Soviets forced upon the Hungarians in the first place. To complete the circle, this is the very same constitution that does not give the Hungarian people any method to impeach their lying leaders. Thus, the leaking of the Prime Minister's musings have since sparked unremitting nation-wide protests.
Because of the media's characterizations of the protesters as "football hooligans," "homeless drunkards," and "Nazis," it is important to get an alternative description of who these people really are. Though this uprising has not been without hooligans, most people in the demonstration are deeply committed to a more peaceful and democratic Hungary and act accordingly. Popular sentiment ranges the continuum between feeling that the Prime Minister should resign, and feeling that the Soviet constitution should be replaced by one created by Hungarians, for Hungary. Participants range in age from children to people who had actually been part of the 1956 Revolution. They, by a great majority, were peaceful and spiritual demonstrators who simply wished through signs, chants, candles, time, and the media, to reach the Hungarian people with their desire for a more honest, democratic, and Hungarian Hungary.
But demonstrators in Budapest have been welcomed only by a series of broken agreements culminating in violence from the Hungarian police. First they were convinced to peacefully "share" the square with the government during the commemoration. In exchange the police promised to let free the various citizens who were imprisoned during the September 18th conflict between protesters, "football hooligans," and police, a promise which has yet to have been met by the police. Neither were they allowed any part of the square, as we have seen in the deceitful and forceful expulsion of demonstrators last night.
And all of this was possible because of something that was noticeably absent through the entire night: the media.
The police and the government knew they could get away with it without anyone noticing, so they did it. And because the protests of 2006 were silenced, we can all sit back and watch the carefully cropped scenes ironically commemorating the protests of 1956, and feel that Hungary is a stable democracy, ready for the loving arms of the EU and the Euro.
But in order for Democracy to function, there must be honesty, and there must be a free press. In Hungary, there is neither.
Even as I write, this story continues to develop. Although there have been road blocks keeping the Hungarian country people out of the capital on this proud day, protesters from within the city are re-gathering in the thousands. We will have to see what the media and police does with them.
________________________
2006.10.23 8:30 P.M.
I have now witnessed a war zone. Can it only have been eight hours? Rubber bullets flying in all directions, towards children and the elderly. Hundreds of tear gas bombs streaming across the sky like rockets, sometimes hitting protesters, tearing flesh here and there. Blood. A man's open face. Protesters hurling rocks from within the clouds of burning tear gas and gunshots. Over a hundred injured. Explosions echoing through the city's old buildings which have known them before. Young protesters pushing 6-foot-tall numbers and letters into the front lines. Read them now: A-S-U-B, 6-9-5-1. From within the chaos a moment of realization: "SZABADSZAG" (FREEDOM), "1956." They are hiding behind them now, so as not to be shot. They are holding the 1956 line. They are tossing stones against bullet proof armor, shields, riot tanks that spray strange streams of painted liquid. Rushing blues and spurting greens, smoky whites.
One group pushes an old Soviet truck into the fray that had been on display in a park nearby. It comes to a rest on the front line, with the letters, useless except as cover and symbolism. They shroud it in an enormous flag whose center has been torn out – the only way to remove the 1956 Soviet symbol from the once pure Hungarian flag of Red, White, and Green. Another group pushes an old Soviet cannon into the square. It sits there, shooting symbols and blocking bullets and gas bombs. Finally, a group somehow manages to hijack a Soviet tank on display in the same park. The engine lets out an old rumble, as if it hasn't been woken in decades, and belches out plumes of white smoke that blend with the tear gas. The tank, DRIVES. There is this tremendous moment of tragic, absurd, triumph. Torn flags waving, the tank jerks and grinds towards the front, its cannon merely a pen writing metaphors in the smoke. Chaos. Madness. Terror. Pride. Most people are watchers from the side -- in awe, disbelief, shame, anger, daze, panic. Eyes red and teared. And I realize – we are suffering, but we stay. We come back for more. We stay. We stay.
Then the terrible ending. We are cornered into a funnel alley. The tear gas is flying. The front joins the watchers in retreat. And all of a sudden, we are trapped. Unable to escape, hardly able to move as we squeeze into this alley and away. People panicking. Tear gas flying over us, into us, in front of us, mace spray and clubs behind us. Terror, claustrophobia, no breath, no escape. Tear gas burning the lungs. A stumbling mass, blind, helpless. We have had enough.
Or so it seems.
As I write this, I see and hear that the people will not go home. The gathering continues, and so too does the violence. They will not go home. Is this possible? What is this mad courage that will not stop? Is it, could it be, that they really care? That they mean to get the changes they feel are needed? That they are willing to risk their lives for it?
- - -
I've had another look at how the local media are presenting the story, and I feel the need to clarify here, again. The media have shown photos of weapons that the police found on the premises of the square as they were searching it. Presumably, this is meant to paint the protesters as something akin to terrorists, justifying the violent and deceitful treatment they were given by the police. There is a lot to say about this. But mainly, I wonder how it is possible that the police knew of these weapons after only having been in the square for about a minute, when they pushed us off down alleys and far away. Or was it never their intention to let us back into the square?
Regardless, is it surprising that they found potential weapons at a campsite of 100 people? Knives are for preparing food. Axes are for chopping wood. Hammers are for beating stakes. What the media fails to mention is that these are the "weapons" that we deliberately and carefully left behind for them to confiscate. We even sorted them into piles! The bottom line is – they set us up, and we bought it, and the media played into their hand.
- - -
As I write now they still have yet to let us enter to retrieve our belongings in the square. For me, this means my tent and sleeping bag. I wonder if I will have to spend another night without sleep or warmth. I wonder how long this can go on before something gives. Will it be the people, or the government?
_________________________________
2006.10.24 10:00 P.M.
The demonstrations have ended, for now. The police broke up the last main gathering around two in the morning, 24 hours after the police first expelled the initial demonstrators from the square. We had been waiting for the farmers union which was to come with agricultural vehicles to support the demonstration, but they did not come in time. They say they will come starting the 2nd of next month. The October 23 day of remembrance has come and gone. But it is not over.
Since then, police levels in Budapest have remained high, breaking up "crowds" as small as ten people all over the city, making it impossible for people to gather. When one man was asked if he was going to continue protesting, he responded, "I feel I
am protesting wherever I am, whatever i do, by just existing."
Back in the square, the next morning, government workers can be seen across the fence taking down the people's tents and stuffing them into numbered bags. I have my embassy speak with the police chief. They are collecting the people's goods to "catalog them and have a media release of the contents." I wonder whether their decision was rather an attempt to deal another blow to the registered sit-in that was to continue in front of Parliament.
From the top, politicians do their writing of history. The "socialist" party blames the opposition party for inciting demonstrators. The opposition party blames the "socialist" Prime Minister for not resigning. Nobody seems to blame the police, or the constitution, or the corrupt and hypocritical parties.
But it is not over.
Luke Janes
e-mail:
lukewarming@gmail.com
