Two media companies—Alhambra Press, publisher of Magyar Hang, and another company that wishes to remain anonymous—have filed a complaint with the European Commission alleging illegal state aid in Hungary’s media sector. Their comprehensive analysis documents a severely market-distorting allocation of state advertising revenues: media outlets aligned with the government have reportedly received over €1.1 billion in subsidies since 2015, creating an extremely uneven playing field. This distortion affects not only market conditions but also undermines Hungarian citizens’ right to information and media plurality. If the Commission upholds the complaint and initiates proceedings, media companies that received illegal state aid will be required to return these funds to the state budget, and the Commission could impose additional fines.
Notably, a similar complaint submitted in 2019 by the Mérték Media Monitor, Klubrádió, and then-MEP Benedek Jávor remains pending, with the Commission yet to decide whether to open formal proceedings. The investigation is to determine whether the funding scheme constitutes state aid and, if so, whether any circumstances exist that might justify such support.
According to Mérték’ analysis, “These prohibited state aids are deployed to realise three objectives: for one, they are used to fund the widest possible dissemination of the governing parties’ political messages with money from the central budget, even if the message serves no discernible public interest whatsoever. At the same time, media companies with close ties to the government need to be subsidised, and in some cases completely funded. Third, by destroying market competition they massively undermine the market positions of independent media, whose main sin is being critical of the government. In EU terms, this what is referred to as prohibited state aid.“