{"id":7140,"date":"2021-07-22T20:34:36","date_gmt":"2021-07-22T18:34:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.direkt36.hu\/?p=7140"},"modified":"2022-10-11T22:33:29","modified_gmt":"2022-10-11T20:33:29","slug":"tavaly-mar-havi-69-milliot-keresett-antall-jozsef-fia-alapitvanya-penzugyeit-kozben-a-nav-is-vizsgalja","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/tavaly-mar-havi-69-milliot-keresett-antall-jozsef-fia-alapitvanya-penzugyeit-kozben-a-nav-is-vizsgalja\/","title":{"rendered":"While a tax audit is underway at his foundation, the earnings of P\u00e9ter Antall rise high"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last year, P\u00e9ter Antall, director of the publicly funded Antall J\u00f3zsef Knowledge Center (AJKC), a pro-government think tank, earned a gross monthly average of 6.9 million forints (about 19 180 euros) \u2013 48 per cent more than the year before, according to the foundation\u2019s latest financial report<\/a>. In 2020, the organization spent a total of 82.8 million forints (230 200 euros) on the benefits of the son of former Prime Minister J\u00f3zsef Antall. This amount, besides Antall’s salary, includes the honorarium for the management of AJKC’s Brussels office and an anniversary bonus.<\/p>\n

In the meantime, there is an ongoing tax audit at AJKC, and several AJKC employees were summoned by the authority to attend a hearing. The National Tax and Customs Administration has initially launched an investigation into the 2019 finances of the foundation but is also focusing on a new online database that gathers the Knowledge Centre\u2019s publications together. While many documents are freely available, some of the content is put behind a paywall, despite the fact that they were created from public funding.<\/p>\n

Help us tell the truth in Hungary, become a supporter!<\/a><\/div>\n

In May, Direkt36 uncovered irregularities in AJKC\u2019s spending<\/a>, which has so far been awarded almost 5 billion forints (13.13 million euros) from taxpayers’ money by the Orb\u00e1n government. Based on internal documents, financial reports, and information from sources familiar with the Foundation\u2019s affairs, we revealed that AJKC\u2019s management made 15 to 20 foreign business trips a year and usually stayed in luxury hotels. Occasionally, the foundation\u2019s money was spent on private trips, private hospitals, professional cameras, and branded suitcases. AJKC also resembles a family business: Antall\u2019s wife is the deputy director and the wife\u2019s twin sister also works at the organization. The wife\u2019s two businesses are contractors of the foundation.<\/p>\n

AJKC issued a statement in response to Direkt36\u2019s article, stating, among other things, that \u201cthe foundation considers the publication of articles that deliberately defame the AJKC to be an unfortunate side effect of the upcoming election campaign,\u201d but no correction was requested for the specific claims in our article.<\/p>\n

According to AJKC, P\u00e9ter Antall’s salary is \u201cadjusted to the salaries of state secretaries working in the public administration,\u201d which is currently a monthly gross of 1.75 million forints (4 900 euros). However, the term \u2019salary\u2019 is not the same as \u2019benefits\u2019 which is indicated in the organization\u2019s 2020 financial statement. Benefits include not only the salary, but also, for example, bonuses and taxes. Answering the queries of Direkt36, AJKC said that, in addition to his monthly salary, P\u00e9ter Antall also receives a honorarium for running their office in Brussels. Plus, in 2020, he was awarded a one-time jubilee bonus on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the foundation and the 5th anniversary of its Brussels office. The foundation did not disclose the exact amount of said honorarium and bonus, nor the net amount of Antall\u2019s monthly earnings.<\/p>\n

AJTK had an average of 40 employees last year, but 19.7 percent of the money spent on all personnel expenses was spent on the director\u2019s benefits. A year earlier, with an average of 42 employees, the same proportion was 11.3 percent. The director’s benefit had risen sharply before: in 2013, he had received only a monthly average of 719 000 forints (2 000 euros), by 2019, it was 4.6 million forints (12 800 euros).<\/p>\n

The improvement of the income situation of Antall is also indicated by the fact that he moved to a new apartment with his wife last year: in the outskirts of Budapest, on the border of a nature reserve, they bought a 225 square meter, panoramic terraced house in a residential park. According to AJKC, the property had been paid from the Antalls\u2019 own savings, partly from inheritance and a bank loan.<\/p>\n

The Prime Minister\u2019s Office and National Tax and Customs Administration launched investigations<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Following the publication of Direkt36\u2019s article about the Knowledge Centre in late May, the Prime Minister\u2019s Office, the main supporter of AJKC, launched an investigation to find out whether public funding was spent \u201cwith good care.\u201d Gergely Guly\u00e1s, the Minister in charge of the Prime Minister’s Office, said on 8 July that the investigation was still ongoing. On 21 July, we asked again about the inquiry, but there has been no answer yet.<\/p>\n

As we revealed earlier<\/a>, despite the ever-increasing financial support of the government, AJKC\u2019s often ran out of money. Employees often had to wait weeks or even months to get paid. Although the Prime Minister\u2019s Office awarded the Knowledge Centre 824 million forints (2.3 million euros) last year, and it received millions from two additional ministries, according to the 2020 financial report, their balance turned negative again. The foundation made a loss of 26.6 million forints (74 100 euros) despite the fact that for most of last year, it was not possible to organise in-person conferences nor travels abroad due to the epidemic.<\/p>\n

According to the financial report, \u201cthe balance sheet shows a loss due to the loss of value of inventories.\u201d According to AJKC, this is related to their book publishing activity because \u201cthe reason for the loss of value is that the cost of publishing our books is higher than what they are sold for.\u201d Work trips were indeed delayed last year due to the epidemic, they added, but conferences were held online. Thus, while venue rents did not count as costs, \u201cthere were costs of professional digitization.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Knowledge Centre plans to solve their financial problems with a partially paid service, in addition to raising additional funds. According to the 2020 financial report, \u201cthe management negotiates with donors to replenish equity in order to raise additional funds. As a summary of the scientific work of recent years, the management has also launched a paid service called the AJKC Digital<\/a>, which generates additional revenue.\u201d<\/p>\n

AJKC Digital has been launched in early 2021. It is an online database which incorporates the think tank\u2019s research material. \u201cAJKC Digital can simultaneously be viewed as a means of legacy preservation and as a platform integrating a library function, thereby young people, university students, and professional audiences can be aided in their studies and work,\u201d reads the website of the database.<\/p>\n

Some of the materials \u2013 about a yearly number of 100-150 analyses, educational articles, podcasts and records of their events \u2013 are now available after a free subscription, but some \u201cpremium\u201d research materials are only available for an annual fee of 2\u00a0500 forints (7 euros). The latter includes AJKC\u2019s quarterly foreign policy magazine \u201cIn Focus\u201d and some scientific publications that, \u201cas extra content, provide a deeper, more detailed analysis of a specific topic,\u201d AJKC wrote in response to Direkt36\u2019s questions.<\/p>\n

According to a source familiar with AJKC’s affairs, the platform has not been very popular so far, as it has only a few subscribers, which means no significant revenue from it yet. AJKC did not respond to our question about the specific number of paid subscriptions.<\/p>\n

Help us tell the truth in Hungary, become a supporter!<\/a><\/div>\n

In addition, AJKC Digital has gained the attention of the National Tax and Customs Administration, which launched a tax audit into the 2019 finances of the think tank, but it is also focusing on AJKC Digital despite its later launch. The tax authority is looking into the matter of putting AJKC publications created using public funding behind a paywall. In June, several AJKC employees were summoned by the authority to attend a hearing.<\/p>\n

Neither the National Tax and Customs Administration nor AJKC have disclosed information regarding the ongoing tax audit saying that any data concerning taxation is confidential. When asked by Direkt36 whether these rules apply to a public benefit foundation that is publicly funded as well, the tax authority stated that all tax-related data is confidential regardless of who the tax subject is.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The think tank of the late Hungarian PM has been awarded almost 5 million forints from the government so far, yet it made losses in 2020. Earlier, Direkt36 uncovered its problematic spending and costly travels.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":6951,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[42,43,186],"ppma_author":[444],"class_list":["post-7140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-az-allam-tanacsadoi","tag-antall-jozsef-tudaskozpont","tag-antall-peter","tag-kozpenz","author-wirth-zsuzsanna"],"authors":[{"term_id":444,"user_id":7,"is_guest":0,"slug":"wirth-zsuzsanna","display_name":"Zsuzsanna Wirth","avatar_url":{"url":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/av_Wirth_Zsuzsa.png","url2x":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/av_Wirth_Zsuzsa.png"},"description":"[:hu]Az ELTE hallgat\u00f3jak\u00e9nt kezdett az Orig\u00f3n\u00e1l dolgozni, ahol t\u00edz \u00e9vet t\u00f6lt\u00f6tt a politika rovat \u00fajs\u00e1g\u00edr\u00f3jak\u00e9nt. H\u00e1romszor is elnyerte a Min\u0151s\u00e9gi \u00dajs\u00e1g\u00edr\u00e1s\u00e9rt d\u00edjat, ezen k\u00edv\u00fcl a G\u0151b\u00f6ly\u00f6s J\u00f3zsef Soma Alap\u00edtv\u00e1ny k\u00fcl\u00f6nd\u00edjasa is. Dolgozott a Forbesnak \u00e9s a Marie Claire-nek, 2016 \u00f3ta pedig a Direkt36 \u00fajs\u00e1g\u00edr\u00f3ja, 2022 \u00f3ta szerkeszt\u0151je is. 2022-ben az OCCRP \u00f6szt\u00f6nd\u00edjasak\u00e9nt tanult a t\u00e9nyfelt\u00e1r\u00f3 \u00fajs\u00e1g\u00edr\u00e1sban alkalmazhat\u00f3 OSINT \u00e9s m\u00e1s kutat\u00e1si technik\u00e1kr\u00f3l. Az ELTE m\u00e9dia szak\u00e1n \u00f3raad\u00f3k\u00e9nt \u00fajs\u00e1g\u00edr\u00e1st tan\u00edt.\r\n[:en]Zsuzsanna started her journalistic carreer at Origo, where she spent ten years at the news desk, covering and investigating various political and social issues as well as corruption and organized crime. She was awarded the Prize for Quality Journalism three times, and is also a special awards winner of the G\u0151b\u00f6ly\u00f6s J\u00f3zsef Soma Foundation. She worked for the Hungarian editions of Forbes and Marie Claire. She has worked at Direkt36 as a journalist since 2016, and as an editor since 2022. In 2022, she studied OSINT techniques as an OCCRP Research Fellow. She teaches journalism at ELTE\u2019s media department.[:]","first_name":"Zsuzsanna","last_name":"Wirth","user_url":""}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7140"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9383,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7140\/revisions\/9383"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6951"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7140"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7140"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7140"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/direkt36.exot.hu\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=7140"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}