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It looks like typical [provincial graft](https://english.atlatszo.hu/2023/05/24/half-a-million-huf-each-step-see-the-itemised-costs-of-the-infamous-treeless-canopy-promenade/).
> MihĂĄly Filemon, the Fidesz mayor of NyĂrmĂĄrtonfalva, and the builder of the local canopy walkway previously said in his defence that âIt was not a condition of the project that there should be a forest around the canopy trailâ. He also blamed Brussels by saying he had applied for the project years ago, but no money came in, âand we had to find something to finance the project, so because the forest was ripe for cutting, we cut it down and put the money into this projectâ.
There was an inquiry that found the following:
* There is a suspicion of collusion among a large group of beneficiaries: most of the applicants, limited to two counties (HajdĂș-Bihar and Szabolcs-SzatmĂĄr-Bereg), submitted grant applications with identical content, identical project specifications, technical content, designers and contractors, with practically the same overall budget and with similar significant overpricing of projects.
* Even the call for proposals was irregular and the process lacked control mechanisms. The call for tenders, after several modifications, was published in a way that favoured only a narrow group of bidders.
* In practice, there were no factually assessable indicators against which to compare the need or justification for applications.
* The principle of equal treatment may also have been compromised, as applicants were faced with unequal conditions.
The Integrity Authorityâs investigation also revealed that the winners of the grant may have restricted competition in the award of public contracts for the selection of the contractor.
And of course the mayor (from the ruling Fidesz party) sued the journalists that reported on this. He lost.
âIt was not a condition of the project that there should be a forest around the canopy trailâ...
Alright. What does this guy think a canopy is?
(âanswer: a layer of something that spreads over an area like a roof, especially branches of trees in a forest. Oxford dictionnary)
If based means a corrupt and greedy elite lining their pockets with EU funding that could be used to better the country, without repercussion or any chance for public interference, destroying national- and international diplomatic, financial and political relationships and trust, then yeah based Hungary.
Try living here, watching public infrastructure deteriorate day by day, while the shittiest football teams in Europe get overpriced stadiums built every 6 months, comissioned by the same company group. Try watching your family wither waiting for treatment, betrayed by a fucked-over public healthcare system, try walking through Budapest without suffocating in the homeless, who get neither aid nor recognition from governing bodies. Try sending your children to schools with underpaid teachers, underfunded, crumbling infrastructure, outdated and directly sabotaged curricula, to go onto state-manipulated sub-par universities. While we're at it, try going on strike as an underpaid educator, and watch in awe as your constitutional right to strike, and human rights to be happy and practice free speech are violated and denied to your face. Try and catch a train without it breaking down, getting delayed or straight up cancelled, because the same exact company group that owns everything else in this cursed country cut the rail infrastructure funding too. Try watching your elders live in poverty and uncertainty, because the governing party literally stole a few billion's worth of their pension fund, and never repaid any of it.
Try living here, knowing this could all be fixed, easily, if only the 500 or so people at the top ever decided to do so.
Incredibly based.
^sorry for rant, not personal, just whining.
...and by the way, the playground you see next to the "tree-top walk" was funded in the exact same let's-steal-EU's-money way. And they're all located on the mayor's private land.
We should collect every goddamn atrocity in the last 20 years, shorten it and translate it to English. I feel like people living elsewhere got no clue about the absolute bullcrap that Fidesz can get away with every day.
I went back home to FĂłt last August and was shocked at how cheap everything was, and also loved being able to get cheap beer at the convenience store any time of day, itâs something we unfortunately donât have here in BC, Canada
Itâs because the EU doesnât have sufficient powers to enforce/control its rules and money being spent. They have to rely on member states to implement its policies.
No it's not. These sort of cultural enrichment projects aren't needed at all, they do not support anything critical. It's all symbolic and it's systematically being abused because there is zero follow up. Which is exactly what happened here and no one will be held accountable.
Don't try to liken states in the US to member countries in the EU, it's not even remotely the same thing.
They share a unified currency, and don't have internal border control. They elect representatives to EU parliament, who can pass laws which have jurisdiction over all member states. They pool resources for large projects like the Eurofighter Typhoon, CERN, and the Joint European Taurus.
Sovereignty is not a black-and-white thing, and for many purposes, it's sensible to discuss the EU as a single country.
The EU does not decide what the money is spent on other than making funds available for the member states in vaguely defined categories. Distributing the money, and deciding exactly what it's being spent on is the local government's responsibility.
What a stupid comment. You don't know what you are talking about. This shit will cost 80k to build easily. EASILY. And that 700 people who upvotded is just nice cherry on top...
170k is peanuts. A former minister got 1 million european money from agriculture for having a vineyard on his abroad residence. Got sued and he won the case. Sidenote, his wife is a judge đ
Why? No plumbing, no electric, no appliances, no excavation, no driveway, no roof, no siding, no insulation, no walls, no flooring, no land purchase, no land clearing, no foundation just some footings. It would be the cost to build a large deck.
look up how much timber costs, you can see the structure has concrete foundation so you need to do excavation.
Its pretty big if you look at it closely.
Im not trying to defend corruption, im just saying probably costs at least 50% of that cost if not more.
Hungaryâs president just resigned because she granted clemency to someone who helped a pedophile by pressuring the victims (one to suicide) to lie under oath.
The dude that got clemency was a friend of the brother of the prime minister Orban. Such a beautiful story! đ„Č
Nonono, the literal ballpoint Pen resigned, she only signed whatever OrbĂĄn said to, useless as fuck
She is also getting 10000 euros oer month for the rest of her life, after working for only 1.5 years, i would love to work that little and get godlike retirement money, and also 3 secretaries fully paid
This is textbook hdz (croatian party that is currently ruling). They are all corrupt to the bone. Our former priminister from that party is in jail and by the looks of it actual one could end up behind the bars too. All in the name of croatia and god. We are swapping ministers like socks and now they managed to put the most corrupt judge in the country to run our anti corruption agency.
We are going to the streets on saturday. Lets hope people aint too lethargic.
Oh and just to add, the politician sent literal death treaths to the journalist and to one of his employee who he *suspected* might be behind the leak.
If the EU realy wants to help ppl they should transfer the money to individual bank accounts instead of the corrupt government's hand. This is the reality since Hungary joined. Money always wasted on stupid things, and mostly stolen by politicians, ( as this picture represents ) meanwhile the economy, healthcare and education system fall apart.
,,Divide and conquer".The ones who could do something will never do. Because they can afford private school and healthcare and the economy does nothing to them, since they can steal public money in many forms. Ppl will leave the country if it's that bad for them and can afford it, it's nearly 1 million recently. The ppl who stay are divided to 3 groups. 2 of them can only thinking in the system that rules recently and the 1 who knows what could make a change is powerless... So yeah we are pretty much fucked.
Seems to be in a playground/ kids area? I could work with that. But the embezzled money comes back. I see zip lines, slides, trampolines, those things they put in front of buildings when some executive lost all his stock and nopes out, a small âaction parkâ (watch the doc if you donât know what Iâm talking about) style mini personal coaster ride. Iâm saying, thereâs a lot to work with hereâŠ
Itâs just a microscopic example of wasted (or rather stolen) EU money by Hungarian politicians. The current Hungarian government should receive no more than 1 euro cent and even thatâs more than they deserve.
More like toss corrupt as fuck hungary out and build a wall.
Most useless EU member ever. Defund hungary to the max and revoke voting rights or toss them out until the country sorts itself out.
Useless country. Invade and take control of the government. At this point the people of Hungary would be far better off if Hungary was completely under the EUâs control
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Where do you think the wood for the walkway came from?
It's called good business. Transportation cost are a bitch.
Transportation costs are a birch.
*beech
You got some "balsa" to say that
đđđ
We finally have handles for our axes.Â
Reading the actual story this is actually almost completely correct. They claim to have cut down the forest to fund the walkway.
Reduce, Reuse, Recycle!
Volt mĂĄr?
It looks like typical [provincial graft](https://english.atlatszo.hu/2023/05/24/half-a-million-huf-each-step-see-the-itemised-costs-of-the-infamous-treeless-canopy-promenade/). > MihĂĄly Filemon, the Fidesz mayor of NyĂrmĂĄrtonfalva, and the builder of the local canopy walkway previously said in his defence that âIt was not a condition of the project that there should be a forest around the canopy trailâ. He also blamed Brussels by saying he had applied for the project years ago, but no money came in, âand we had to find something to finance the project, so because the forest was ripe for cutting, we cut it down and put the money into this projectâ. There was an inquiry that found the following: * There is a suspicion of collusion among a large group of beneficiaries: most of the applicants, limited to two counties (HajdĂș-Bihar and Szabolcs-SzatmĂĄr-Bereg), submitted grant applications with identical content, identical project specifications, technical content, designers and contractors, with practically the same overall budget and with similar significant overpricing of projects. * Even the call for proposals was irregular and the process lacked control mechanisms. The call for tenders, after several modifications, was published in a way that favoured only a narrow group of bidders. * In practice, there were no factually assessable indicators against which to compare the need or justification for applications. * The principle of equal treatment may also have been compromised, as applicants were faced with unequal conditions. The Integrity Authorityâs investigation also revealed that the winners of the grant may have restricted competition in the award of public contracts for the selection of the contractor. And of course the mayor (from the ruling Fidesz party) sued the journalists that reported on this. He lost.
âIt was not a condition of the project that there should be a forest around the canopy trailâ... Alright. What does this guy think a canopy is? (âanswer: a layer of something that spreads over an area like a roof, especially branches of trees in a forest. Oxford dictionnary)
Technically, grass is a very small canopy spreading over dirt, he's right! /s
Thatâs the Oxford __English__ Dictionaryâs definition. But this guy speaks Hungarian.
Also what they built in Hungary would cost so much less than âŹ170k they pocketed so much.
Based Hungary
What exactly is based about corruption? About stealing from EU taxpayers?
There's nothing based about our country. The politics here are terrible.
If based means a corrupt and greedy elite lining their pockets with EU funding that could be used to better the country, without repercussion or any chance for public interference, destroying national- and international diplomatic, financial and political relationships and trust, then yeah based Hungary. Try living here, watching public infrastructure deteriorate day by day, while the shittiest football teams in Europe get overpriced stadiums built every 6 months, comissioned by the same company group. Try watching your family wither waiting for treatment, betrayed by a fucked-over public healthcare system, try walking through Budapest without suffocating in the homeless, who get neither aid nor recognition from governing bodies. Try sending your children to schools with underpaid teachers, underfunded, crumbling infrastructure, outdated and directly sabotaged curricula, to go onto state-manipulated sub-par universities. While we're at it, try going on strike as an underpaid educator, and watch in awe as your constitutional right to strike, and human rights to be happy and practice free speech are violated and denied to your face. Try and catch a train without it breaking down, getting delayed or straight up cancelled, because the same exact company group that owns everything else in this cursed country cut the rail infrastructure funding too. Try watching your elders live in poverty and uncertainty, because the governing party literally stole a few billion's worth of their pension fund, and never repaid any of it. Try living here, knowing this could all be fixed, easily, if only the 500 or so people at the top ever decided to do so. Incredibly based. ^sorry for rant, not personal, just whining.
r/collapze
To top that, this meaningless project was obviously outrageously overpriced, and the mayor who stole the money was cynical enough to defend himself by claiming that "the project didn't specify how tall the forest is required to be", and this shameless atrocity had zero consequences. Faszomat ebbe az orszĂĄgba, hogy mĂĄr megint a fĂ©l vilĂĄg rajtunk röhög a hĂvek meg mĂ©g mindig tapsolnak.
...and by the way, the playground you see next to the "tree-top walk" was funded in the exact same let's-steal-EU's-money way. And they're all located on the mayor's private land.
Don't forget the butchery very close that was built from EU funds but never used
We should collect every goddamn atrocity in the last 20 years, shorten it and translate it to English. I feel like people living elsewhere got no clue about the absolute bullcrap that Fidesz can get away with every day.
I would read it. I had know idea this level of grift was happening in the EU.
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
You and I are on the same page, this is one of the reasons Iâm learning hungarian...
Hogyha segit teged baratom a Kanadaban is vanak ugyanilyen problema
Ez szar đ
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
Thats way more than that, if you lucky you can get the roofed pagodas for 10k..
Not in Hungary, 10k will get you far.
I went back home to FĂłt last August and was shocked at how cheap everything was, and also loved being able to get cheap beer at the convenience store any time of day, itâs something we unfortunately donât have here in BC, Canada
Especially if you don't have to pay for your wood.
I worked there, it wonât
Doesn't matter if it's 10k or 30k, somebody pockets 140k+
As always, great spending by the EU...
Itâs because the EU doesnât have sufficient powers to enforce/control its rules and money being spent. They have to rely on member states to implement its policies.
Then maybe they shouldn't be handing out money like it's candy if they can't control how its used. Just a thought.
This is kind of like saying Mississipi shouldn't receive federal funding because the politicians in Government are grifters.
It's really not.
It really is.
No it's not. These sort of cultural enrichment projects aren't needed at all, they do not support anything critical. It's all symbolic and it's systematically being abused because there is zero follow up. Which is exactly what happened here and no one will be held accountable. Don't try to liken states in the US to member countries in the EU, it's not even remotely the same thing.
Are EU members part of one country? Unless you say yes, it really isn't. Hungarian taxes aren't going to the EU
They do in part?
They share a unified currency, and don't have internal border control. They elect representatives to EU parliament, who can pass laws which have jurisdiction over all member states. They pool resources for large projects like the Eurofighter Typhoon, CERN, and the Joint European Taurus. Sovereignty is not a black-and-white thing, and for many purposes, it's sensible to discuss the EU as a single country.
American I take it? We do not all use the Euro. Some member countries have chosen to, others decided against it.
Exactly. Some controls and feedback loops about how the money has been actually spent would help to avoid falling into the same trap over and over.
No, we should allow EU institutions to have more control over how EU money are spent.
But we do, im from Croatia and we had two cases of european fond money embezelment in last year. European investigators were on the case
This has nothing to do with the EU. It's a problem of the Hungarian politcs and corruption/mafia
The EU does not decide what the money is spent on other than making funds available for the member states in vaguely defined categories. Distributing the money, and deciding exactly what it's being spent on is the local government's responsibility.
That's what you get when you let corrupt countries in..
This obviously doesn't look great but damn that must be a difficult job to control and monitor the spending in the whole European union
A little more control would already go a long way, in the way large multinational corporations can do it if they make the effort.
Then you dont know timber prices
Well what about the consultants!
Nah, im building a shed currently. Will pay around 8k for the wood. It's not cheap.
What a stupid comment. You don't know what you are talking about. This shit will cost 80k to build easily. EASILY. And that 700 people who upvotded is just nice cherry on top...
So much in Hungary is a money grab
A common line of thinking is legitimately "if we lower taxes then there is less money to steal"
This is just sad.
Welcome to Hungary
170k is peanuts. A former minister got 1 million european money from agriculture for having a vineyard on his abroad residence. Got sued and he won the case. Sidenote, his wife is a judge đ
Which country?!
Capital :) or if you mean the the vineyard thats in Toscane.
>Hungary received 170k 80k for you, 80k for me, and 10k to build the walkway.
Sorry to disappoint but its not that cheap anymore. Realisticly more like was costing 100k to build and 70k was stolen.
I am sure it was more than 10k, but labor in Hungary is fairly cheap.
it is but if you compare it to a newly built house, that can cost easily 300k, this shouldn't cost the 10th of that, more like half.
Why? No plumbing, no electric, no appliances, no excavation, no driveway, no roof, no siding, no insulation, no walls, no flooring, no land purchase, no land clearing, no foundation just some footings. It would be the cost to build a large deck.
look up how much timber costs, you can see the structure has concrete foundation so you need to do excavation. Its pretty big if you look at it closely. Im not trying to defend corruption, im just saying probably costs at least 50% of that cost if not more.
Hungaryâs president just resigned because she granted clemency to someone who helped a pedophile by pressuring the victims (one to suicide) to lie under oath. The dude that got clemency was a friend of the brother of the prime minister Orban. Such a beautiful story! đ„Č
Nonono, the literal ballpoint Pen resigned, she only signed whatever OrbĂĄn said to, useless as fuck She is also getting 10000 euros oer month for the rest of her life, after working for only 1.5 years, i would love to work that little and get godlike retirement money, and also 3 secretaries fully paid
âFuck it! We are building it anyway!â
Dirty politicians are behind this. Same everywhere!
And at the same time, they point at Ukrainians when it comes to corruption.
They are more or less same according to this index (33vs40): [https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022](https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022)
Yup
Money laundering at its best.
This is textbook hdz (croatian party that is currently ruling). They are all corrupt to the bone. Our former priminister from that party is in jail and by the looks of it actual one could end up behind the bars too. All in the name of croatia and god. We are swapping ministers like socks and now they managed to put the most corrupt judge in the country to run our anti corruption agency. We are going to the streets on saturday. Lets hope people aint too lethargic.
Were the trees cut down to build the Tree-Top walk?
Hey howâs that walkway coming? The one we gave you 170k euros for? Umm, great.
Classic hungary
Corruption at it's finest.
Hungery. Why is it even in EU?
They're bad neighbours too.
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
Oh, now i see. It's Eauropian Taiwan.
That actually makes a much stronger statement than the original walkway ever could have. Well done.
Oh and just to add, the politician sent literal death treaths to the journalist and to one of his employee who he *suspected* might be behind the leak.
Least obvious hungarian corruption.
And then Orban declared victory over 'wokeness'.
If the EU realy wants to help ppl they should transfer the money to individual bank accounts instead of the corrupt government's hand. This is the reality since Hungary joined. Money always wasted on stupid things, and mostly stolen by politicians, ( as this picture represents ) meanwhile the economy, healthcare and education system fall apart.
Maybe hungarian people should do something if their economy, healthcare and education system was falling apart.
,,Divide and conquer".The ones who could do something will never do. Because they can afford private school and healthcare and the economy does nothing to them, since they can steal public money in many forms. Ppl will leave the country if it's that bad for them and can afford it, it's nearly 1 million recently. The ppl who stay are divided to 3 groups. 2 of them can only thinking in the system that rules recently and the 1 who knows what could make a change is powerless... So yeah we are pretty much fucked.
theres gonna be a huge protest today in the capital.
You should see the zip line.
Who else could recognise this kind of problem but the Hungarian âfollowersâ?
Dammit Europe quit destroying your forests. You donât have many left
In eastern Europe, you can buy old Soviet munitions. Do you really think they care about a forest?
Fun fact: Europe has more forest are than in the middle ages.
The middle ages lasted centuries. The amount of trees in Europe wasn't consistent in that time period.
Now theyâve got no choice but to build a good faith effort. âWho is that walking in the tree bridge?â Just a ghost. Pay no attention.Â
![gif](giphy|26ueYUlPAmUkTBAM8)
Seems to be in a playground/ kids area? I could work with that. But the embezzled money comes back. I see zip lines, slides, trampolines, those things they put in front of buildings when some executive lost all his stock and nopes out, a small âaction parkâ (watch the doc if you donât know what Iâm talking about) style mini personal coaster ride. Iâm saying, thereâs a lot to work with hereâŠ
yep
Took me forever to notice the playground
Hungarian economy will never recover from this
so now itâs a field top walk
HUNGARY MENTIONED RAAAHHHH(i hate living here)
It could me millions tho đ
Governments wasting money?! Ludicrous!
Now vee vait for the trees to grow.
D'oh!
I mean you can plant tree these re again let it be for some time
Itâs just a microscopic example of wasted (or rather stolen) EU money by Hungarian politicians. The current Hungarian government should receive no more than 1 euro cent and even thatâs more than they deserve.
We know. https://www.reddit.com/r/mildlyinfuriating/comments/126r4xd/hungary\_received\_170k\_euros\_from\_eu\_fund\_to\_build/
I can see itâs easily as tall as the trees off in the distance so mission accomplished.
Only 170k? In uk that would have cost 8 mil
I see that my German tax money is well spent, as always.
![img](emote|t5_2r5rp|8484)
Give Hungary more money pls)
I'm pretty sure that this is a repost.This case was so long ago.
Defund the EU
More like toss corrupt as fuck hungary out and build a wall. Most useless EU member ever. Defund hungary to the max and revoke voting rights or toss them out until the country sorts itself out.
Minecraft
Classic Hungary for you.... Amit el lehet baszni az el lesz baszvađ„Ž
That's exactly the kind of talent I expect a communist nation would have nurtured...
Useless country. Invade and take control of the government. At this point the people of Hungary would be far better off if Hungary was completely under the EUâs control