Magyar Hírek, 1985 (38. évfolyam, 2-26. szám)

1985-05-11 / 10. szám

ABOUT THIS ISSUE AND THE PREVIOUS ONE The Hungarian section of the pre­­vions issue gave a detailed account of the 13th Congress of Hungarian So­cialist Workers’ Party held between the 5th and 28th of March in the new Congress Centre of Budapest. The re­ports and remarks at the meeting expressed support for the consistent continuation of the established po­litical line. Many speakers discussed the most important problems of the country, doing so openly, and em­phasising also the critical aspects. A report on the five years that passed since the last congress was handed to delegates in advance in printed form, indeed, it was also published in the press, thus János Kádár supplemented the written report in his speech, which opened the discussion. “Our Party is gov­erned by firm principles, and not dogmas”—he said among others— “and it is striving to find the right, the socialist ansv/er to the new problems of progress. Life moves fast, new questions emerge at the new, more developed levels of soci­ety, questions, which the answers given ten or twenty years ago no longer satisfy completely. . . We regard as ideal politics that are firm in principles, prudent and thoughtful in execution, and ever ready for renewal.” János Kádár spoke with heavy emphasis on the policy of alliance which embraces everybody who is in agreement with the fundamental national objectives. “Our prime ob­jective was in the past, as it will be in the future”—he said—“to rally, to hold together all of the creative forces of the nation, to unite them in a strengthening and growing so­cialist unity, which fundamentally defines the political image of Hun­gary.” This national unity is strengthened by socialist democracy, the further flourishing of which is an important part of the policy of the HSWP. “It is necessary and pos­sible”—János Kádár said—“that the hundreds of thousands, the millions of working people should have a say in decisions, in the control of imple­mentation, and in the management of their own destiny.” Speaking about the economy, he emphasized the importance of so­cialist planning, the use of indirect means of control. “Our system of economic management”—he said— “which has been working success­fully for the past sixteen years, is one of the systems worked out and introduced in socialist countries. For us it is one of the means of the realization of our socialist plans. Our achievements are not small: there is full employment, social se­curity, and a reasonable standard of living. We are endeavouring, besides ensuring equal rights to people, to establish also more equal chances in education, personal development, and the choice of occupation ... W’e want to attain higher standards of living and better living conditions, but on a firm and safe basis”—János Kádár said. Spirited debate followed the open­ing speech, in the course of which fifty-eight delegates spoke. Károly Grósz, First Secretary of the Buda­pest Party Committee stressed that the relatively easily mobilizable reserve of the Hungarian economy is creative, active man himself. In this connection he called for an improve­ment in the financial rewards and status acknowledgement to the tech­nical intelligentsia. György Lázár, Chairman of the Council of Minis­ters, said it was a great achievement that the financial liquidity of the country was successfully maintained under difficult world economic cir­cumstances, but this also meant that less could be used for domestic con­sumption and investments. Stable equilibrium and the mobilization of new growth energies are necessary for further progress—he said. Ferenc Havasi, a member of the Political Committee and Secretary to the Cen­tral Committee, emphasized that the extension of child care allowances, the increase of the benefits given to families with three or more children, and the favourable home contracts allowed to young people will cer­tainly alleviate the problems of families. Imre Pozsgay, General Sec­retary of the Patriotic People’s Front, made an important statement con­cerning the role of national minori­ties: “An indispensable international condition of our progress is that the peoples of Central Europe, of the community of socialist peoples, should prosper together, free of pre­judices, of ill feelings, and of lately acquired, yet rather provocative na­tionalism .. . learning to respect one­­another, and to respect the national minorities’, right to existence, their community creating intentions. Only those states can claim the rank of civilized country in the 20th century, which learned . .. that the nation that form the majority must show favour to national minorities; that the national minorities can be pro­moters and not obstacles of the state-creating, social development role of the national majority. We regard the national minorities living in Hungary and the Hungarians living beyond our borders as bridges between our peoples”—Imre Pozs­gay said. After János Kádár’s closing speech the congress elected the top execu­tives of the Party; János Kádár was elected General Secretary and Ká­roly Németh Deputy General Secre­tary. * “Plan and Market”, an article by András Tábori published in the Hun­garian section of our journal deals with a problem that interests many people: how can a planned economy be reconciled with flexible reactions to market processes, with the reli­ance on fiscal means, with the de­velopment of competition, and with the independence of the enterprises? The Hungarian practice—Tábori points out—proves that it can very well. What the experience of the past fifteen years shows is precisely that the fewer obligatory directions there are, the better a planned econ­omy can operate. According to Tá­bori, the reform introduced in 1968 abolished the obligatory plan direc­tives and this considerably increased the independence of the enterprises. The plan consultations with the min­istries survived, however, and in reality these still limited the scope of authority of the enterprises. The new step that started with the 1st of January 1985 will establish com­plete independence for enterprises. The workers elect the manager, they can themselves decide matters such as the quantity, composition and marketing of the products, loans and investments, while the influence the ministries exercised over them will cease. However paradoxical it may sound, progress in the course of the reform does not diminish, but up­grades the fulfilment of the plan— Tábori concludes. That is that in­terest is more efficient than argu­ments, the fiscal and market forces propel the economy towards the plan targets better than verbal negotia­tions. The government machinery will work out decision alternatives of the national—not enterprise— processes for economic policy. This is how the next Five-Year Plan is being prepared at the moment, cal­culating a number of variations in the course of preparation, weighing the probabilities of the external economy and the domestic processes. * Besides the Esterházy collection— about which there is a report also in the Hungarian Scene—another group of works of art, the Delmár collection is now on public view now. The collection, originally owned by Dr. Emil Delmár, a builder and contractor, who left Hungary in 1939, includes numerous master­pieces of 16th—18th century Euro­pean sculpture. A niece of the founder deposited the collection in the Museum of Fine Arts in 1940, which became the owner of the pieces now partly by way of dona­­pieces now partly by way of donation, and partly by purchase. The collection consists of twenty-three pieces. The most outstanding of these is a 16th century bronze statue by Andrea Riccio. Two quattrocento terracotta reliefs, and a 14th century “Madonna of Pears”, a work of an artist of the Low Countries, are also worthy of special note. There is a remembrance of Moth­ers' Day in the Hungarian section. The day is being celebrated in Hun­gary this year not only with flowers and various events, but also with the extension of social allowances guar­anteed to mothers and their children. The recently completed kindergarten featured in the Hungarian section is also an example of practical efforts made to help mothers. ZOLTÁN HALÁSZ LETTER TO THE EDITOR Remembering Sándor Pethő In our senior years in the Tavasz­mező utca (Springmeadow Street) Gymnasium we got a new history teacher, not many years older than we were: Sándor Pethő. He gave my life a direction which I still pursue. Eventually, he too, was destined to move high on the career ladder, accomplishing the highest aim, a national reputation. As a historian, author of basic books, and then as the editor of the Budapest daily, Magyar Nemzet, which, under his editorship, became an influential liberal newspaper in a politically conservative period of interbellum Hungary. Hungary, at the time we were students, was an agricultural coun­try, ninetyfive percent of which was owned by the historically privileged group, mainly the aristocracy and the Church. So, in those early days, before the Great War young people could learn a lot from teachers like Sándor Pethő. And we did. He opened up our eyes to the reality of the world —not the children’s tales that were accepted as history. In the class­rooms of Sándor Pethő events looked differently from their fictional role in the official language. We learned from him that we lived in a rich land of poor people. Our history teacher not only taught us but also told us where to find truth in a field where it was a rarity the appraisal of national gen­iuses. In those days some of the key countries were not “nations” in our sense of the word. Austria was not; nor the Czarist Empire; or the Ot­toman Empire, to mention just a 28

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