Zaraegersek, Hungary —
The sign proudly announces that the roundabout near Zalaegerseg in western Hungary was built with 500 million forints (about $1.5 million) in funding from the European Union.
The roundabout was built to provide a container terminal for a new railway line that would improve access to the sea in inland areas of central Europe. Goods arriving from the Adriatic coast will not have to pass through the Hungarian capital Budapest and will be quickly transported through the western part of the country to countries such as Slovakia, the Czech Republic and Poland.
But there’s a problem. Many years have passed since the roundabout was built, but there is still no railway. Instead, the roundabout lies unused in the field, waiting for the Hungarian government to build a railway that will make it available.
Critics of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán say such EU-funded construction projects are a monument to the economic system his government has built during its 16 years in office. They say Mr. Orbán’s electoral success is based on his willingness to accept huge sums of money from the EU, while ruthlessly demonizing it and portraying it as a decadent, liberal and corrupt force in Hungary.
Much of that money came from efforts aimed at helping the bloc’s poorer, more recent member states, many of which were once part of the Warsaw Pact, catch up with their wealthier neighbors in the West. But ahead of Sunday’s crucial parliamentary elections, the opposition is asking what Hungary has to show for all this investment, pointing to a series of vanity projects and unfinished or unnecessary construction projects.
“Mr. Orbán was the ultimate rent-seeker in the European Union in the 2010s. It was a conscious strategy,” Christian Orbán (no relation), founder of the region’s investment firm Oriens, told CNN. He also highlighted the government’s success in withdrawing allocated funds compared to neighboring countries, adding that Orban “was able to attract huge amounts of EU funds.”
The roundabout near Zaraegersek, first reported by Hungarian research site Atrazzo, is one of tens of thousands of Hungarian projects that have received EU funding since Viktor Orbán took office. Regional Development Minister Tibor Navraksis told the Hungarian parliament last year that the EU had funded 52,000 projects in the country during the 2014-2020 budget period.
István János Tod, director of the Budapest Corruption Research Center and a Zalaegerseg native, said the roundabout was a good example of a “white elephant” – a construction project that costs money to build and maintain but has little value.
“Without European funding, Prime Minister Orbán would not have been able to establish this kind of system,” Todt told CNN.
Corruption watchdog Transparency International ranks Hungary as the most corrupt country in the EU. CNN has contacted Hungary’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Prime Minister’s Office for comment. The Hungarian government usually denies corruption allegations or accuses the opposition of being corrupt themselves.
Work on the roundabout began during the current EU budget period until 2027. After purchasing the land, Metrans, a logistics company operating in the area, planned to build a container terminal that would connect to a new railway that was also planned to be built.
At a ceremony in 2021, Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó laid the cornerstone of the new terminal. The mayor of Zaraegerseg, Zoltan Baraic, told CNN that the local government, with the help of EU funds, has built a roundabout to support logistics around the terminal by the end of 2023.
However, when CNN visited the site in April, there was no sign that construction of the planned railway had begun. Baraich said the project is still in the public procurement stage. Regardless of who wins the procurement contract, construction of the line will take more than two years, and even if the line is built, it may not be completed until 2029, Atrazzo reported.
The roundabout near Zaraegerseg is not the only unfinished or useless project to receive EU funding in Hungary. Former U.S. Ambassador to Hungary David Pressman said during his tenure that construction projects did not always meet demands.
“Great view from another EU-funded ‘forest canopy walkway’ in Hatvan in Hungary,” he wrote on social media in 2024, posting a photo of himself standing on a walkway with no forest in sight.
Other examples reported in Hungarian media include “observation decks” less than a meter high, intended to provide a viewing platform for tourists.
Critics say Hungary is dotted with such projects, often funded by the same institutions that Mr. Orbán opposes.
“Instead of addressing the broken economy, Prime Minister Orbán is pointing out that he is plundering outside forces that are said to be a threat to Hungarians and Hungarians,” Pressman told CNN.
“It is much easier for the leader of the European Union’s most corrupt country to talk about a ‘civilizational struggle’ than to explain the extraordinary wealth his family has amassed while his people and economy suffer,” he said.
The issue of EU funding plays a key role in the campaign for Sunday’s parliamentary elections.
The European Commission has withheld funding to Hungary since 2022 over concerns about democratic backsliding and judicial independence. As of last year, about 18 billion euros ($21 billion) of funds remained blocked, equivalent to about 10% of the country’s GDP. Late last year, MEPs again raised concerns about rule of law violations, corruption and “misuse of EU funds” in Hungary.
Economist Kristian Orbán said the influx of EU funds during the first decade of Mr Orbán’s term “allowed him to get away with a lot of things, including corruption, including the neglect of public services, because he was able to definitely improve the lives of people who were not used to it.” Now those EU funds are blocked and the negotiations are collapsing, he said.
President Orbán and his allies, including U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance, who traveled to Budapest this week to support him, have accused the EU of meddling in Hungary’s elections over withholding funding. The European Commission insists that EU member states must abide by the rule of law in order to receive funds.
Péter Magyar, leader of the opposition Tisza party, has promised to waive the EU payment, allaying the EU’s concerns about democratic backsliding in Hungary. He has campaigned fiercely against corruption, accusing Orbán and his followers of lining their own pockets while the country becomes poorer. Still, the Magyars will face a tough challenge to meet the EU’s demands and free up some of the funds by the Aug. 31 deadline.
Mr. Tisza has maintained a double-digit lead over Mr. Orban’s Fidesz party in most opinion polls for more than a year. A victory for the Magyars would put an end to Mr Orbán’s “bite your hand and feed” approach to the EU, which corruption expert Mr Todt described, but Hungary will still need financial aid from Brussels, including from Zalaegerseg.
Mayor Baraichi said that if the Hungarian government builds the planned railway, the city will be able to build a second roundabout to support logistics around the container terminal. It would cost an additional 954 million forints (about $3 million), he told CNN. This also comes from EU funds.
