In a live interview with Zalaegerszeg Television on Tuesday, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that in the modern world, if a settlement cannot be reached quickly, investors will not choose it as an investment location; this is why a dual-carriageway link to Zalaegerszeg must be provided with government support.
The Prime Minister gave the interview after having signed a cooperation agreement with the city’s mayor as part of the Modern Cities programme.
Mr. Orbán said that Zalaegerszeg has much to offer and investors have shown interest, but still they have not chosen the city. The main reason for this is that nowadays, if a city cannot be reached quickly, investors do not select it as an investment location.
“By itself Zalaegerszeg cannot solve the problems resulting from its isolation”, the Prime Minister stated, saying that it cannot build a motorway independently; this can only be done through government action.
“Zalaegerszeg is a city with a strong work ethic and hard-working people”, with appropriate education levels, skilled labour and a significant urban culture. The city also has an important industrial, entrepreneurial history, he said: in past times it was famous for its food processing and light industry, and since the fall of communism flagship industrial developments have been launched.
“Many things are in place, but something is not moving forward.” In recent years the Government has directed every investor coming to Hungary to Zalaegerszeg, the Prime Minister explained. “They came, they looked around, they negotiated, they liked everything, but they did not choose Zalaegerszeg.”
He said that he senses that “unless we do something, the city will lag behind and the world will pass it by”. He recalled that during the first government term of Fidesz, Zalaegerszeg was one of the most dynamically developing cities in Hungary, but after the change of government in 2002 and the economic crisis of 2008 the city had started to lag behind, and therefore “we must help the city get back on the path of development”.
A significant part of the problems of the Zala county seat result from its lack of accessibility, as is also the case for a couple of other municipalities at county-level, which “are not fully part of the country’s economic circulatory system”, because they are hard to reach. The Prime Minister explained that this is why the Government wants to connect the city to the M7 motorway by 2018, and this is why construction will also be started on linking to the M9 motorway in the direction of Vasvár.
In his interview, the Prime Minister repeated the investment decisions on which he had signed an agreement with the city’s mayor. Mr. Orbán said that the Government will spend HUF 1 billion on expanding the business incubator in Zalaegerszeg and that, depending on investors’ demands, an industrial rail link may be built to the city’s northern industrial park. He also said that the railway and bus stations will be coordinated and that a 50-metre indoor swimming pool will be constructed. Furthermore, a pilgrimage site dedicated to Cardinal Mindszenty will also be established.
In answer to a question, he said that he had not been to Zalaegerszeg for years, as “things were going well, this is a calm city, where the culture of cooperation is stronger than in a number of other parts of the country”. Here, even political life – which is so often characterised by conflict and debate – is relatively calm. “I am usually invited to or sent to places where there are problems, where there is a fire to put out – but Zalaegerszeg is not one of those places”, Mr. Orbán said.