Magyar Egyház, 1983 (62. évfolyam, 1-5. szám)

1983-03-01 / 2. szám

13. oldal

PROGRAM PROPOSAL

Of the editor of the underground paper “Ellenpontok" (“Counterpoints”) in order to change the plight of the Hungarians in Rumania, who are deprived of their civil rights.

The Hungarians of Transylvania /and of Rumania in general/ today are going through, which is perhaps, the most critical phase of their long history, threatening their very existence. The rights which would guarantee their survival are only illusory and serve as coverup for the practical and actual handling of the Hungarian problem by the authorities and which is radically different from the official statements and speeches.

Therefore:

I. We demand, that we should be considered an inseparable part of the Hungarian nation and as such, being at the same time Rumanian citizens, permitted to cultivate our relationship with The People’s Republic of Hungary, without any hindrance, on an institutional as well as individual level.

1. Every Rumanian citizen should be able to travel to the Hungarian People's Republic without any restriction.

2. The orders should be rescinded, according to which we are not permitted to out up our visiting foreign friends in our homes. (This order punishes us, Hungarians most.)

3. Our cultural institutions as well as the different cultural groups active within those institutions should be free to invite Hungarian organizations and individuals from the neighboring countries.

4. Until the Hungarian universities are restored in Transylvania, the Hungarian students of Rumania should be allowed to study in Hungary; after their return they should be employed according to their qualifications acquired in Hungary.

5. The Rumanian custom authorities should stop the almost customary arbitrary confiscation of the Hungarian cultural publications.

6. Using relay stations, the broadcasting and receiving of the Hungarian (Budapest) television program should be extended to the entire territory of Transylvania.

7. It should be made sure that Hungarian books published in the Hungarian language area (Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union) are available also in Rumania.

8. It should be possible to subscribe without any restriction to all the newspapers and periodicals published in Hungary and these publications ordered there should reach the addressee in Rumania.

9. The natural interest of known intellectual and political personalities in Hungary in, and their justifiable concern with, the fate of their fellow-Hungarians in Rumania should not be considered as meddling in the internal affairs of Rumania.

II. We demand that the right of the Hungarians, living in Rumania as an ethnic community, concerning

institutional self-preservation and cultural autonomy, should be guaranteed.

1. As an amendment to the 22. paragraph, the constitution should contain the right of the nationalities to form their organizations to safeguard their interests, whose office-holders would be elected in a democratic process by the members of the organizations.

2. Such organization of the Hungarians in Rumania should have the right to direct the Hungarian cultural life ana educational policy, to control the cadre policy as related to Hungarians, to take care and protect monuments, buildings and art relics connected with the Hungarian historical past.

3. Every Hungarian in Rumania should have the right to join this organization, whose aim is to protect the interest of the Hungarians, irrespective of the part of the country, in which he or she lives [i.e. not only Transylvanians],

4. The organization should have its own press organ.

5. The story of the Hungarian People’s Federation should be written [a representative organization of the Hungarians in Transylvania till 1949. Ed.] and the true circumstances of its liquidation in 1949 should be made public.

6. All leaders of the Hungarian People’s Federation who were imprisoned should be rehabilitated publicly, together with those, who were sentenced to prison in the past thirty years, because they attempted to protect the interests of the Hungarians; and those sentences should be invalidated.

7. The fact should be officially acknowledged that our culture is an integral part of the Hungarian culture and not some kind of a branch of the Rumanian culture.

8. They sould set up, within the framework of the Ministry of Education and that of the different county schoolboards, departments for the nationality education of nationality students in their own language, and they should be on equal footing with the ones handling the Rumanian education.

9. They should restore the Hungarian kindergartens and all other Hungarian educational institutions. These should guarantee potentially for the Hungarian children the education in their native language from the kindergarten on to high schools [secondary schools] and vocational schools in all counties where Hungarians live.

10. They should institute Hungarian orphanages and special schools for retarded and handicapped children where they are taught in their own language, there by putting a stop to a procedure now generally practiced by which these children are placed in Rumanian institutions in order to Rumanize them.

11. They should enforce the 6/1969 law concerning the status of the teaching

personnel, which states that a pedagogue who does not speak the language or speaks it inadequately, cannot teach Hungarian classes.

12. The continuance of a Hungarian school with Hungarian classes is contingent upon the number of attending children. There is an obligatory minimum requirement. If the number of children in the class is below this number, the Hungarian classes are integrated into Rumanian schools. They should lower this requirement in order to keep the Hungarian schools in the villages open. We should adopt the exemplary educational policy of Yugoslavia, which sets up a school for nine students of any nationality group in the country. The Rumanians should apply the same standard in this respect to Hungarian children as they do to the Rumanian children.

13. In Hungarian schools the history and geography of Rumania should be taught in Hungarian.

14. The Hungarian universities should be restored and in each special professional field educational institutions of higher learning should be established.

15. The sphere of activity of the nationality publishing house should be broadened and its financial funds increase, so that they could apply themselves to the task of publishing books in the language of the nationalities, because it is totaly neglected by the rest of the publishers.

16. The Hungarian press and the Hungarian radio and television programs should be free to analyse and discuss the vital problems of the Hungarians in Rumania.

17. The Rumanian authorities should put a stop to their habitual attitude of treating the Hungarian intellectuals as suspicious individuals. They should not be subjected to surveillance and harassment by the security forces just because they happen to be Hungarians.

18. An effective freedom of religion should be guaranteed, also the true internal autonomy of each church.

III. We demand self-administration for territories with predominantly Hungarian population and an equitable part in the administration on this country.

1. Let the Szekely-land obtain, this time a true, autonomy, which would extend to its entire territory.

2. A stop should be put to the practice, whereby villages and other communities with an all-Hungarian or predominantly Hungarian population are managed by Rumanians [president of the council, president of the farmer’s co-operative, party secretary, police etc.]

3. The Hungarians should have their representation, according to their numerical ratio, in the legislative body of the country, and the party membership but