Anybody following Hungarian public life might be familiar with the anti-NGO campaign that has been launched by the Hungarian government. The NGO Act adopted recently has been severely criticised in Hungary as well as in the European Union. As it violates EU law, the European Commission has launched an infringement procedure against Hungary over the legislation. In the present case, a civil society organisation had to defend itself against a propagandist from a government-friendly news outlet.

Request denied

The journalist, who writes for the pro-government newspaper Magyar Hírlap, brought the Hungarian Civil Liberties Union (HCLU), a Liberties member, to court for denying the release of data that the organisation was not obliged to hand over to the journalist, as it did not qualify as public interest data. The journalist sued the watchdog organisation, even though it publishes more data on its home page than it is obliged to under Hungarian law.

The journalist requested extensive data concerning the work of HCLU since its establishment 23 years ago, including the salaries of its entire staff and all the contracts concluded by the organisation.

The court found in favor of HCLU, recognising in its decision that the operations of the organisation were transparent, and that it provided the journalist with appropriate information. The decision is being appealed to a second instance court.