Thread by @pmdfoster

So. My very last file for @TelegraphWorld is a short news piece about Viktor Orban's emergency #coronavirus powers which leave him able to 'rule by decree' and should worry absolutely everyone. Here's why.

1/Thread

telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/3…

@TelegraphWorld There's is a pretty good account of the issues here from Kim Lane Scheppele in Hungarian Spectrum - but in essence the legislation leaves Orban free to over rule Hungarian law on a whim - worth a read /2

hungarianspectrum.org/2020/03/21/kim…

@TelegraphWorld What is important is the BACKDROP to this move by Orban, who has spent the last four or five years turning Hungary into a client-state where the checks and balances (judiciary, free media, indepenent civil service) have been winnowed away /3

@TelegraphWorld Here's a long-read for @Telegraph that I did with @balazscseko on life 'inside a dying democracy'....it's not as simple or obvious as 'dictatorship', it's like a tree with a weevil; superficially still standing, rotting from within /4

telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/05/2…

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko A world where opposition parties struggle to book a room for a campaign event at election time....but where the government can still point to opposition parties and say 'hey, there's democracy' /5

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko A world where there is a 'vibrant' online media - 'hey, still democracy' but where 476 media outlets are all coralled under one umbrella, held by up one of Mr Orban's oldest friends. As @otiliadhand notes, the vast bulk of media is state-captive /6

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko @otiliadhand A world where the government asks the civil service to collect anti-immigrant stories for its election campaigns; where civil servants are cowed and corrupted by new labour laws designed to tame them /7

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko @otiliadhand It is against all of that background that these open-ended new laws need to be seen.

Five years in jail for spreading 'fake news' about the virus....but in that media environment, when is that really just 'unwelcome news' ? /8

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko @otiliadhand But there is a wider point here, which relates to the #coronavirus outbreak and the levels of state intervention that we may all need to accept if life is going to get back to normal - if we want a workable exit strategy before a vaccine is available. /9

@TelegraphWorld @Telegraph @balazscseko @otiliadhand It may be that only South Korean, or Taiwanese-style track-n-trace measures are the way to get us all back to work before a vaccine arrives.

BUT key to this being acceptable in democracies is TRUST. As I explored here last weekend.... /10

telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/03/2…

So the University reseracher who accidentally switched his phone onto 'airplane' mode and was awoken by an angry policeman in Taiwan is actually (after his initial shock) grateful for the oversight /11

In South Korea, alert system transmits details of fresh Covid-19 cases to every mobile phone, warning people they may need to get tested. Names are not disclosed but details include age, and where the person lives or works. /12

It's the kind of surveillance that we reject in Europe instinctively - turning our mobile phones into 'the enemy in our appartment' as one German MEP put it - but those kind of attitudes may change. May have to. /13

Which is why what @Mij_Europe identifies as Orban's opportunism is even more damaging and dispiriting than it is usually. /14

https://twitter.com/mij_europe/status/1244583670771527680?s=12

@Mij_Europe That last piece was only possible with so many great colleagues @TelegraphWorld - @H_E_Samuel @justinhuggler @sophia_yan @NickSquires1 @JamesCrisp6 @JamesERothwell @niccijsmith @RolandOliphant @jpfbadcock and others over the years who are too numerous to mention. Been a joy. ENDS