The Guardian of Liberty - Nemzetőr, 1988 (11. évfolyam, 1-6. szám)

1988-03-01 / 2. szám

12 ISRAEL TOUR Poland's State Jewish Theatre staged three plays in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem during a recent tour of Israel lasting nearly a month. The director of this Warsaw theatre, Szymon Szurmiej, is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Sejm (parliament). CEAUSESCU 'FRAIL’ President Ceausescu, the Romanian Com­munist Party leader, looked frail during a recent visit to Senegal. His officiai programme was light. According to several eye-witnesses, he often hod difficulty in reading his speech at a State banqet given for him in Dakar on March 11. Romanian diplomats have strongly denied the reported claim that he was wearing make-up, a practice common among senior army of­ficers in Bucharest before the Second World War. THE 6ITÂRV1M OF USÏRTY (NEMZETÖJ?) Erscheint 2monatlich. Einzelpreis für Deutschland DM 4,— Edited by the Editorial Board Verleger, Herausgeber und Inhaber TIBOR KECSKÉSI TOLLAS NEMZETŐR Ferchenbachstr. 88 • 8000 München 50 FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF GERMANY Verantwortlicher Redakteur (Editor): ZOLTÁN RÁD Ferchenbarhstraße 88, D-8000 München 50 Druck (print): DANUBI A DRUCKEREI GMBH Ferchenbachstraße 88, D-8000 München 50 AFRICA REPRESENTATIVES & SALE CAMEROON: L. T. JOHNSON, Divisional Inspectorate of Education, NKAMBE, North West Province, Republic of CAMEROON. EAST AFRICA: (2.— Sh, by air) (Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania): General-Representative : International African Literary Agents. P.O. Box 46055 NAIROBI, Kenya; NIGERIA (2.— Sh): Yemi OYENEYE, P. M. B. 101, Agege, Lagos. SIERA LEONE: (10 Le. c.; annual: 60) 1. Alusine B. Kargbo, c/o 2 Alusine St., Newsite Kissy, Freetown; SOMALIA: (2.— Sh., by air) Haji Jama Ali, P.O.B. 248, Hargeisa. MAURITIUS NALANDA Co. Ltd., 30, Bourbon Str., Port-Louis. GREAT BRITAIN F. Szabó, 100 Liddel Gardens, London N.W. 10 U. S. A. Mrs. Helen Szablya, 4416.-134 th PI. S. E. Bellewue, WA. 98006. Tel.: (206) 643-1023. AUSTRALIA Mr. Jenő Beák, 3/50 Warrandyte Rd., RINGWOOD 3/34 Vic., Australia PRICES: Surface mail: 1 copy AFRICA 1.80 Sh (100 CFA), Britain 60 P, Australia, USA, Canada: $ 2,— Germany: DM 4.— Annual subscription: AFRICA Sh 10 (500 CFA), Britain 3 —£, Germany/Europe: DM 20.- (or equivalent) Australia USA, Canada: $ 10.— For mir mail mid MS •/• For students 50 */« discount Our BANK ACCOUNT: No. 2605756 Commerzbank AG. Munich, Federal Republic of Germany. MARCH-APRIL, 1988 MORE NEWS FROM HUNGARY More than 10,000 Marched in Budapest on 15 March* chanting “Democracy“ and de­manding reforms. It was believed to be the biggest unofficial demonstration in Hungary since 1956. The Police made no attempt to obstruct the march which took place only hours after at least four leading members of the opposition were arrested on subver­sion charges in a series of dawn raids. Ac­cording to the samizdat publisher, Ferenc Koeszeg, the four were Gabor Demszky, a dissident publisher; Tamas Molnár; Attila Solt, a sociologist; and Miklós Haraszti, a writer. György Gado, a leading speaker at a smaller event last year, was also believed to be in police custody. On the 140th anniversary of the day when the poet Sándor Petőfi led a rebellion against Austrian rule, demonstrators crammed the square by the parliament building in Pest to cheer at calls for freedom and national independence. The crowd carried banners with slogans such as “Press Freedom“, “Real Reforms“ and „Freedom of Assembly“, and draped them around statues along the way. One speaker, the philosopher Gáspár Miklós Tamas, told the protesters “Leaders who have lost the confidence of the people should resign“. A similar demonstration last 15 March, in which 2,000 to 3,000 Hungarians took part, was the first time since 1956 that the author­ities had tolerated such an open expression of dissent. Journalists’ Union Calls for End to Censor­ship. Hungary’s official journalists’ union has added its weight to a campaign for abo­lishing censorship in the state-controlled media. Mr. Imre Pozsgay, a leading reformer who is head of the Patriotic People’s Front, recently proposed that the Communist Party should retain control only of the party press. Neither party nor government has respond­ed to the demands for greatly reducing or abolishing censorship. The party’s dilemma is that while it favours a plurality of views in public, it does not want them to endanger its leading role. One Budapest journalist said the party vould now have to show its “co­lours“. He and his colleagues would join the Democratic Forum (see page 9) if the author­ities did not make concessions on press free­dom. The Hungarian Parliament Approved Go­vernment Policy Toward Churches during the first major “debate“ on Church-state re­lations since the Communist takeover. The policies of the Chairman of the State Office for Church Affairs, Imre Miklós, won un­animous approval in a December parlia­mentary discussion. Miklós presented the assembly with the main lines of his policy, which are characterised by the gradual re­laxation of the tight restrictions imposed on religious activity during the Stalinist era, and the maintenance of strict political super­vision of Church activity. Though critics were silent during the parliamentary dis­cussion both aspects of this policy have come under fire in recent months. On the one hand, hardliners within the party believe that the loosening of restrictions threaten the supremacy of Marxist-Leninist ideology in Hungarian society. On the other, refor­mers —- who now pose the greatest threat to Miklós’ policies — have been arguing that the Churches can only make an effective contribution to the national well-being dur­ing the present economic and moral crisis if they are free from state intervention. Price Controls To Be Dropped. The Hun­garian government is to relinquish control over most consumer prices at the end of March, according to MTI. On 31 March “free prices will be introduced with the exception of staples and some public services“. The move is the latest of many market-oriented measures to be introduced by Hungary. MTI also gave details of sweeping price increases introduced at the beginning of 1988 as part of a government programme that also abo­lishes subsidies and introduces Eastern Europe’s first value added tax (VAT). As of 1 January, the price of 53 percent of all goods and services rose by an average of 16.2 percent. Hungarian Unemployment could rise from 10,500 to 200,000 in the next two years, ac­cording to the official news agency MTI. In response,, the authorities plan to encou­rage people to start private business. The news agency reported that 0.2 percent of the five million-strong workforce is now without work. This would increase this year to 30,000 to 40,000, including a large number of long-term unemployed, and by up to 200 000 in the year 1990. MTI said the go­vernment planned to introduce in the second half of 1988 an enterprise scheme under which it would give preferential loans to the jobless. A Profile on Hungarian Unemployment by Susan Greenberg, The Financial Times (5 January): “(...) Reliable figures do not exist, partly because there is little incentive to register as seeking work. And while un­employment is still very low by Western standards, the trend shows that it is grow­ing. The number of people officially register­ed as seeking work in the third quarter of last year was 10,465, according to govern­ment statistics. The figure was 7,595 in the same period of 1986. “Mr. Janos Kollo and Mr. Karoly Fazekas of the Hungarian Institute of Economics re-cently completed an analysis of the Hun­garian labour market, probably the only one of its kind. They found that although the total number of official vacancies (55,473 in the third quarter of 1987) seems to exceed the number of job seekers, the two do not match up in location, age, sex or skills de­manded for the jobs on offer. In some ways the picture is surprisinly similar to Western Europe. Unemployment is concentrated in towns like Ozd and Miskolc in the north, which are dominated by declining heavy in­dustries such as coal and iron. Those select­ed first for the sack are similar; the older and unfit, young and rootless, women with young children or people from an ethnic minority such as gypsies. Many are unable to move to find work, such as women who help to tend the family plot. (...)“

Next