On Sunday at the Budapest migration conference of the Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC), the Minister of State for EU Affairs at the Prime Minister’s Office described migration and the problems experienced in relation to local and regional identities in the context of migration as the most important challenge of all time.
Szabolcs Takács as last speaker of the three-day conference said people in Hungary believe that European awareness and the European way of life are in danger. He added that in the past three and a half years he has witnessed the “very serious and tough” EU debate which has been ongoing between the Member States and institutions of the European Union.
“This […] has poisoned our participation in the European Union,” he said, stressing that economic growth, security and competitiveness are all in danger, and Europe’s significance within the world – also due to its declining population figures – is diminishing ever further.
Mr Takács said the EU was not prepared for the migration crisis that started in 2015. In that year hundreds of thousands of people entered EU countries illegally, he pointed out.
He highlighted that the EU’s first response was that it sought to “manage” the situation, instead of solving the problem. This has proved to be a mistake, and has led to far more problems, said Mr Takács, taking the view that the most important task is “to stop illegal migration”. The closure of borders in this respect is inevitable, and problems must be addressed locally.
He said it is regrettable that during the debate the European Commission had fallen victim to the “manager syndrome”. This manifested itself in the Commission having utterly ignored the opinions of others and in having failed to assess the situation in its entirety. The European Commission decided to resort to “standard methods”, and to treat all the symptoms individually “without making an effort to eliminate the cause of the disease,” Mr Takács said.
He highlighted that Hungary’s position regarding the management of migration has been clear right from the beginning of the crisis: all methods of fraud must be removed from the system, border protection must be reinforced, and the root causes of migration must be eliminated.
According to Mr Takács, Member States must be given back their leading role in the area of migration as “managers may well do their job well, but it is leaders who make the right decisions”.
The Minister of State said the three-day conference helped participants to much more thoroughly understand this global challenge, the management of which requires ongoing dialogue.