The Romanian Supreme Court canceled the fine imposed by the National Anti-Discrimination Council (CNCD) two years ago on President Klaus Iohannis for hate speech against Hungarians, Romanian news sources reported on Friday, explaining the decision of the supreme judicial body the previous day.
In January of last year, the ruling panel in Bucharest found the fine imposed by the CNCD to be justified and rejected Iohannis' appeal. In its final ruling on Thursday, the Supreme Court upheld the head of state's appeal, annulled the infringement decision of the CNCD and canceled the fine imposed.
According to the CNCD, Klaus Iohannis violated the human dignity of his fellow Hungarian citizens when, in 2020, he mocked his social democratic political opponents with a Hungarian-language greeting and accused them of selling out Transylvania.
Iohannis launched an attack against the Social Democrats after the lower house of the bicameral parliament did not put on the agenda the draft law providing territorial autonomy for Székelyföld, so the initiative submitted by the two Hungarian representatives, József Kulcsár-Terza and Zsolt Biró, was passed as a motion tacitly accepted by the house of representatives. to the senate competent to make a decision. The omission had only symbolic significance, as the Senate had to vote on the draft autonomy statute of Székelyföld, which was unanimously rejected by the Romanian parties.
After the tacit acceptance by the House of Representatives, Klaus Iohannis on April 29, 2020 still wishes you a Hungarian-language Good day, PSD!, and Good day, Ciolacu! (the president of the PSD) ridiculed the greetings and accused the PSD, which had the largest parliamentary faction and was still in the opposition, of giving Transylvania to the Hungarians, and asked the PSD president a rhetorical question: what did the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán promise in exchange for the agreement? ?
The anti-discrimination council started to investigate Klaus Iohannis's statement based on the request of the Mikó Imre Legal Advocacy Service, and later - the Speaker of the PSD, Marcel Ciolacu - also complained to the CNCD about Iohannis.
The CNCD voted 6:1 that the head of state's statement, playing on prejudices against Hungarians and lashing out at the loss of Transylvania, is hate speech, and the fine of 5,000 lei (415,000 forints) imposed for this reason was accepted by the council 5:1.
Iohannis described the decision of the CNCD condemning him as a political decision and appealed to the administrative court to annul the decision.
The reasons for the final judgment of the Supreme Court will be published later.
Source: Hirado.hu
Image: Szabadság.ro
