Speech of Viktor Orbán at the EPP Congress in Madrid, on the 22nd of October in 2015.
Good afternoon, Ladies and Gentlemen, President, dear Delegates,
I would like to congratulate to Partido Popular and to the Spanish Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy for the outstanding performance of their government. Today I would like to speak about the migration crisis. This issue will determine the future of our political family. We are in a deep trouble. The migration crisis is able to destabilize governments, countries and the whole European continent. We need a strong and clear-cut answer, timetable and action plan of EPP. The Hungarian delegates welcome the resolution of the congress, declaring that the Spanish approach is the right one.
Dear Friends,
The danger we have been facing demands open and honest speech. First of all, dear Friends, what we have been facing is not a refugee crisis. This is a migratory movement composed of economic migrants, refugees and also foreign fighters. This is an uncontrolled and unregulated process. I would like to remind you that free choice of a host country is not included in the international law. I also want to underline that there is an unlimited source of supply of people, after Syria, Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Africa is now also on the move. The dimension and the volume of the danger is well above our expectations.
Dear Colleagues,
This is the right time to make clear the nature and the dimension of our moral responsibility. We are Christian democrats so the issue of moral responsibility must also be put high into consideration. We have a heartfelt compassion for the people who left their homes. They are victims of the bad governance of their own countries. They are victims of bad international political decisions. And they are victims of our bad European policy as well which raises expectations that are impossible to be fulfilled. They are obviously victims of the human traffickers. But considering them victims must not turn ourselves into being victims. Just because we do not consider them enemies we must not act against ourselves. Our moral responsibility is to give back these people their homes and their countries. It can’t be our objective to provide them with a new European life. Right to human dignity and security are basic rights. But neither the German, Austrian nor the Hungarian way of life is a basic right of all people on the Earth. It is only a right of those ones who have contributed to it. Europe is not able to accept everyone who wants a better life. We have to help them to get back their own lives with dignity and we have to send them back to their own countries.
Dear Colleagues,
Let me draw your kind attention to the fact that European Christian democratic approach doesn’t tolerate any anti-Muslim policy. Muslim faith which we honor and respect is not responsible for the root causes of this mass migratory movement.
Dear Delegates,
We cannot avoid speaking about the quality of our democracies. Does it comply with the freedom of information and speech that medias usually show women and children while seventy percent of the migrants are young men and they look like an army? How could it happen that our people’s feel that their opinion is not being put into consideration? And we have to address the question whether our people want what has been happening. Did we get authorization from them to allow millions of migrants to enter our continent? Did we get authorization not to comply with the Schengen regulations for months? No, distinguished Delegates, we did not. And it is not a convincing argument any more that what we have been doing is because of emergency. I believe we have to gather all our courage, we have to throw away PC-ness and we should launch a big debate. We have to discuss our own intentions regarding our own continent without hypocrisy and pharisaism. What do we think about our civilization heritage? Can the change of cultural pattern forced externally? Do we accept parallel societies? Or we defend our tolerant and rule of law based way of life we have lived so far?
Dear Delegates,
Europe is currently rich and weak. This is the most possibly dangerous mixture. We seem not to be able to overcome our challenges on our own. Turkey is an important strategic partner. But if based on the lack of our own power we expect the solution from them that will make us exposed. This is the current situation of Europe. If we do not want that we have to protect our borders. If we are unable to do so at Greece which is the Eastern gate of the Balkans and the first line of defence than we have to do it at the Western gate of the Balkans at Hungary and Slovenia.
Dear Friends,
We cannot hide the fact that the European left has a clear agenda. They are supportive to migration. They actually import future leftist voters to Europe hiding behind humanism. It is an old trick but I do not understand why we have to accept it. They consider registration and protection of borders bureaucratic, nationalist and against human rights. They have a dream about the politically constructed world society without religious traditions, without borders, without nations. They attack core values of our European identity: family, nation, subsidiarity and responsibility.
Dear Friends,
We are EPP. Our behavior should not be determined by the opinion of our rivals. We are a strong and great party. The stronger the attack, the stronger we need to fight back. We need to be ready to fight for our principles. We have to be innovative as well. In the rise of the new crises, the old ways do not work anymore. We need courage and new experiments, even if not every idea we try succeeds, but it should not stop us from trying. And we should not attack those who are trying. I thank for our President and for sister parties who defended us, Hungarians in the difficult times when we offered new solutions.
Dear Friends,
We are the European People’s Party – Partie Populaire, Volkspartei, Partido Popular, Party of the People – our responsibility is towards the people. Listen to the people. Let’s be determined, let’s defend Europe. Do not let the leftist mess up and reconstruct Europe! And do not let them oust the soul of Europe! Do not let liberals and socialists take away Europe from the people!
Thank you very much for your attention.