“It’s very easy to get the EU funds if they want to give it to you, as we could see in the case of Poland, where they could get the funds with a page-and-a-half action plan, which is still not implemented because of legislative difficulty,” Bóka said.
Fundamentally, that is why Bóka said he believed “the court will not issue any judgment that would put Poland in a difficult position.”
Bóka risks leaving office with Orbán after the April 12 election, with opposition leader Péter Magyar leading in the polls on a platform of unlocking EU funds, tackling corruption, and improving healthcare and education.
The Commission is, separately, withholding another €18 billion of Hungarian funds — €7.6 billion in cohesion funds and €10.4 billion from the coronavirus recovery package.
“I think Péter Magyar is right when he says that the Commission wants to give this money to them … in exchange, like they did in the case of Poland, they want alignment in key policy areas,” he said, “like support for Ukraine, green-lighting progress in Ukraine’s accession process, decoupling from Russian oil and gas, and implementing the Migration Pact.”
“Just like in the case of Poland, they might allow rhetorical deviation from the line, but in key areas, they want alignment and compliance.”