Digitalisation and the growing illegitimate influence of private power-holders behind it is a challenge threatening the dignity and individual rights of European Union citizens, László Kövér, Hungary’s speaker of parliament, said in an online meeting. This is a common concern for both left-wing and right-wing politicians, Kövér told the annual conference of EU parliamentary speakers. He shared the concern of his colleagues about “the polarisation of politics”, and attributed division to “our loss of trust in one another”. He warned that trust should no longer be undermined, and stressed the need to “demonstrate that we are interested in one another’s opinion”. The speaker added, however, that by voicing concern over the state of democracy, the European left followed the “old Bolshevik principle” that “the enemies of democracy are not entitled to democracy” and “it is the left that defines who are the enemies of democracy”.
Meanwhile, Kövér lamented that national parliaments were only sent an invitation to Sunday’s opening event of an EU conference on the future of the bloc on Friday evening. He said that the year-long conference being run by EU institutions gave the impression that “the entire process is an act with a pre-written script and a pre-determined outcome.” Kövér said it was national parliaments and not the European Parliament, the European Commission or the European Council that had the strongest democratic legitimacy in the bloc.