It has already turned out that the mayor is at war with the numbers, and in many cases he spent the budget not on mandatory tasks, but on all kinds of ideas, consultants, rewards and the "leftist circle of friends".
Gergely Karácsony admitted that he governed Budapest close to bankruptcy. The left-wing districts are at the forefront in paying fines, issuing irregular tenders, and in one-step tenders. Compared to the nine years when István Tarlós led the city, Karácsony can already "boast" of many times more fines.
While Budapest's busy intersections are in unsustainable conditions, Gergely Karácsony continues to brag about the renovation of the Chain Bridge and demands billions from the government. Unpleasant conditions prevail in several parts of the city center, especially in the left-wing Józsefváros, Blaha Lujza tér, as well as the public toilet handed over as part of it. The state of the public areas of the eighth district has deteriorated a lot in recent years.
Speaking about the sense of security, the left-wing mayor András Pikó himself spoke at a previous board meeting, where he admitted that the numbers in terms of public safety are really bad enough for us to worry together...
"I would like to continue the way we took over the city in 2019 - from the right-wing city administration - then there was indeed a downward trend," said András Pikó after the district police chief's report.
It has also been revealed that the mayor is at war with the numbers, and in many cases he spent the budget not on mandatory tasks, but on all kinds of ideas, consultants, rewards and the "leftist circle of friends".
A lot of money disappeared from the pockets of the citizens of Budapest due to the capital's irregular public procurement. Karácsony have already paid hundreds of millions in fines.
The left-wing districts are also at the forefront in paying fines, issuing irregular tenders and one-step tenders.
The City Hall, with its left-wing majority, has so far paid at least three hundred million forints in fines only for irregular public procurements.
If we compare it with the nine years when István Tarlós led the city, Karácsony can already "boast" of many times more fines.
All this means incompetence, incompetence, carelessness or even something else. In the case of the latter, I am referring to the purchase of trams in Frankfurt, when the City Hall received a fine, but in the end no trams were bought - this was said by Zsolt Wintermantel, the leader of the Fidesz-KDNP faction in the capital. According to Wintermantel, another fine is expected for the renovation of the Chain Bridge this year, as they were not able to notify the subcontractors in time. Karácsony make mistakes all the time, they simply cannot or do not want to avoid irregularities.
One of Gergely Karácsony's few serious and wasteful blunders is the one hundred and fifty million tram tender.
On the last day of the extraordinary legal order (2021), Karácsony decided on his own to purchase used vehicles from Frankfurt worth seven billion. The public procurement was issued illegally, probably "preparing a successful tender for the Frankfurt trams".
It then turned out that Frankfurt no longer needs the scrapped trams because they cannot be air-conditioned.
The Public Procurement Decision Committee revealed several serious violations of the law in connection with the tram muti. Thus, in addition to the fine of one hundred and fifty million, the Emergency Police also ordered an investigation into the suspected crime of "agreement restricting competition in public procurement and concession procedures".
The capital's transport company also announced an irregular public procurement in 2021, due to the renovation of Blaha Lujza Square.
By the way, the City Hall's companies dealing with transport organization and operation were fined more than two hundred million forints together with the advertising tender until the end of 2021, which was paid by Budapest taxpayers.
Such was the public procurement of multi-functional trucks, which cost BKV an additional five million forints. Or Katalin Tüttő's bus rental tender: we can talk about wrongly sold airport shuttle bus tickets and nearly one billion forints lost in connection with the advertising tender. During the BKV's second-hand bus rental tender, they contracted with a company that didn't even have a bus, and during the tender, it tendered with buses owned by another company. Since then, the Karácsonys have not answered who decided to conclude a contract with an offshore company close to Tamás Leisztinger, and who is responsible.
After the 2019 elections, the mayor should only have signed the valid and winning bid with the French multinational company. Based on the contract, he would have paid more than HUF 1.7 billion per year for eight years for the right to use the advertising surfaces belonging to the vehicle sector and BKK's infrastructure (adjusted for inflation). But that didn't happen, Karácsony rather re-announced the same public procurement. After the repeated procedure, slipping into the period of the Covid epidemic, the same company won the same tender for two and a half times less money.
The loss of the people of Budapest is thus roughly 2.6 million forints per day, around eighty million per month, and almost one billion forints per year.
From the end of 2019 until now, the Karácsonys have thrown HUF 3.5 billion out of the window.
The Public Procurement Decision Committee ordered the capital to pay a penalty of HUF 115+5 million due to the advertising tender.
