In response, almost the entire editorial team resigned and founded a new, crowdfunded platform, Telex. The ultimate decision to remove Dull from his post, meanwhile, came from one of the foundations who owns Index’s publisher, Index Zrt. A few months prior to Dull’s termination, Mihály Vaszily, a businessman with strong ties to the government bought 50 per cent of Indamedia, the company responsible for selling Index’s advertisements. In July 2020, Szabolcs Dull, editor-in-chief of the country’s leading independent news website, Index.hu, was fired less than a month after he warned readers that the publication was coming under increasing political pressure. Klubrádió is not the only independent news outlet to fall in recent months, leaving Hungarian readers and listeners more and more under KESMA’s news monopoly. “It’s an unheard of concentration of media, similar to which may have existed only under communism,” continues Hardy.
Consisting of just under 500 national media outlets, the conglomerate’s aim is to restore and preserve traditional Hungarian values through mass media. Such news outlets usually come under the umbrella of KESMA (the Central European Press and Media Foundation) a media conglomerate controlled by the ruling Fidesz party. “It is very important to understand that the overwhelming majority of media ownership (in my view, 95 per cent of all media) in Hungary undermines democracy and fairness of any elections since a lot of people are uninformed, or receive only government biased information,” says Mihály Hardy, head of news and current affairs at Klubrádió. Using both propaganda campaigns and legal attacks, the past 10 years have seen the closures of opposition newspapers, theatres, and universities, as well as the scapegoating of migrants and the LGBTQ+ community.
After Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party won a landslide victory of two-thirds of parliamentary seats in the 2010 national elections, the government began taking steps to transform Hungary into an illiberal state.
They’re left stranded in a country with no free analogue medium beyond the illiberal government’s reach”, wrote Papp.īut for many, Klubrádió’s fate is little surprise. Those who are not tech-savvy enough for online listening – or who cannot afford internet access – are losing this connection to a world they knew and needed. “For many, the sound of the radio is the signal that sequences time, filling voids, providing familiarity, while introducing a sure dose of new into established habits. With Hungary’s ageing population, traditional media outlets, such as Klubrádió’s analogue offering, played an important role in reaching households without internet or alternative news sources, which is a real danger in the Hungarian countryside. Under permanent pressure, this is what people do mentally too: they grow used to it and adapt their everyday lives to allow for what they actually can accomplish,” former Klubrádió anchor Réka Kinga Papp wrote in a personal editorial letter about her time at the radio station.Īfter 18 years, the station was reaching a weekly audience of around 300,000 people, a significant proportion of the 3 to 3.5 million people living in Budapest and its metropolitan area. The spirit, like the body, adjusts its growth to compensate for pain and restricted motion certain muscles tighten when others are disabled. “One can grow used to sustained pressure. The unresolved eight-year legal battle prepared Klubrádió for the worst. It also provided a place for public discussion by representing public figures and politicians from the Hungarian opposition.
Covering mostly news and culture, the station focused on topics not covered by government-run media channels, such as discrimination against Roma minorities, animal welfare, and consumer and trade union rights protection, as well as contemporary theatre and music. Founded in 1999, it was one of the only remaining commercial radio stations in Hungary free from government ownership. But worried activists and human rights organisations believe the closure is another attack on Hungary’s already shrinking alternative media presence.Īs a traditional media outlet, Klubrádió achieved the status of a cultural institution. Klubrádió will be able to continue broadcasting online.