{"id":6486,"date":"2020-09-23T11:07:10","date_gmt":"2020-09-23T09:07:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.direkt36.hu\/?p=6486"},"modified":"2022-10-11T22:39:44","modified_gmt":"2022-10-11T20:39:44","slug":"meg-a-kormany-is-draganak-talalta-az-m4-es-epiteset-dokumentumok-bizonyitjak-hogy-orban-apjanak-cegetol-vettek-hozza-a-koveket","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/meg-a-kormany-is-draganak-talalta-az-m4-es-epiteset-dokumentumok-bizonyitjak-hogy-orban-apjanak-cegetol-vettek-hozza-a-koveket\/","title":{"rendered":"Orban\u2019s father was involved in controversial road construction"},"content":{"rendered":"

For years, one Hungary\u2019s most expensive state infrastructure projects, the construction of the M4 road, connecting Budapest with the Hungarian-Romanian border, has been stalling. The high costs of the investment had previously been criticized by the European Union, but the Hungarian government stood behind the construction \u2013 during the time when Prime Minister Viktor Orb\u00e1n and Lajos Simicska, a Hungarian oligarch whose company participated in the construction, were close allies.<\/p>\n

In the spring of 2015, shortly after Orb\u00e1n and Simicska had turned agains each other, one phase of the construction (carried out by K\u00f6zg\u00e9p, a company then belonging to Simicska), was suspended by the government. According to J\u00e1nos L\u00e1z\u00e1r, who headed the Prime Minister’s Office at the time, the costs of the suspended construction were \u201cmagical,\u201d \u201cone kilometer of road in the flat Great Plain costs 4 billion forints (11 million euros).\u201d L\u00e1z\u00e1r also predicted that the suspension of the construction would make it possible to \u201cinspect each and every invoice\u201d of the construction.<\/p>\n

Although the Hungarian government has not published the results of these inspections since then, Direkt36 has obtained the detailed documentation of the project. These revealed that the company of Orb\u00e1n’s father also took part in the costly state project: his mining company, Dolomit Kft., delivered crushed stone to the construction. Among other things, the asphalt mixture of the M4, the roadside and the stop lane were made of stones of the mine owned by Orb\u00e1n\u2019s father.<\/p>\n

Even though during his first term as a prime minister, Viktor Orb\u00e1n asked his father not to participate in state projects,\u00a0in our series of articles we revealed that the father\u2019s companies have been involved in several public works, which contributed to the spectacular growth of his businesses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

We asked Dolomit Kft. and the main contractors involved in the construction of the M4 about the exact amount and value of building materials supplied by the company of Orb\u00e1n\u2019s father, but they did not answer our questions. Nor did the prime minister respond to our questions about his father\u2019s involvement in state projects.<\/p>\n

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The companies of the Orb\u00e1n family usually participate in public projects as suppliers of building materials. As there is no publicly available information about the suppliers of state projects, Direkt36 launched a public information lawsuit in 2017, in order to get detailed information about 6 large infrastructure projects. The Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU) Dr. Zsolt Szegedi provided legal help. As a result, we received 28 cardboard boxes with more than a hundred thousand pages of documents \u2013 this is where we found evidence that proves that the company of Viktor Orb\u00e1n’s father was involved in the construction of M4.<\/p>\n

After the Orb\u00e1n-Simicska conflict, the government realized that the road was expensive<\/h2>\n

The M4 was originally designed as a highway to replace one of the busiest and most accident-prone sections of the Hungarian road network, today’s road 4 (Budapest-Szolnok-P\u00fcsp\u00f6klad\u00e1ny) and road 42, leading to the Romanian border (P\u00fcsp\u00f6klad\u00e1ny-Beretty\u00f3\u00fajfalu-\u00c1rt\u00e1nd).<\/p>\n

The first section of M4 was completed in 2009, under the socialist government, but most of the investment took place during the Orb\u00e1n government. However, the construction has been slower and more expensive than planned: so far, less than 100 kilometers of road were finished out of the planned more than 200 kilometers.<\/p>\n

The construction of a 28-kilometer section of the project (between Abony and Fegyvernek) started in 2013, when the prime minister and his old friend, Lajos Simicska, previously the economic director of Fidesz, were still close allies. Besides big international construction companies, K\u00f6zg\u00e9p, a company belonging to Simicska at the time, also received a valuable contract for the construction of the section, built from more than 110 billion forints (over 300 million euros).<\/p>\n

The Hungarian government planned to finance the construction of this section from EU funds, but the European Commission raised concerns over various aspects of the project, including its extremely high price. In response, the government withdrew its funding application in 2014, but continued to stand behind the project. Shortly after the Orb\u00e1n-Simicska war, however, the government’s position suddenly changed: the construction of the Abony-Fegyvernek section was suspended on the grounds of cartel suspicion, and at the same time, the win streak of K\u00f6zg\u00e9p also ended on public tenders.<\/p>\n

As we revealed earlier, the businesses of the Orb\u00e1n family started to show spectacular growth, partly thanks to state contracts, after the outbreak of the conflict with Simicska.\u00a0<\/a>
\nUntil then, it was Simicska’s taskto limit the family businesses\u2019 involvement in public projects, in order to spare Orb\u00e1n from similar political attacks he had come under during his first term as prime minister between 1998 and 2002, when he was frequently criticized because of his father\u2019s alleged involvement in state projects.<\/p>\n

After the conflict between Simicska and Orb\u00e1n, this restriction was lifted. As documents prove, the company of Orb\u00e1n\u2019s father remained involved in the construction of the M4 even after the government began to criticize the project. According to one document, building materials had also been ordered for the Abony-Fegyvernek section from Dolomit Kft.<\/p>\n

G\u00e1nt\u2019s excellent stones<\/h2>\n

The building materials supplied by the Orb\u00e1n company were delivered to the road section between \u00dcll\u0151-Albertirsa and Albertirsa-Cegl\u00e9d.<\/p>\n

In the documentations from 2017 and 2018 of these constructions, we have found dozens of documents bearing the name of Dolomit Kft. Among other things, documents presenting the materials used for the construction; the company’s performance declarations for its own products; and various test reports.<\/p>\n