On Wednesday evening the Cabinet Office of the Prime Minister informed MTI that the Government has decided to make a recommendation to Budapest City Council and the Hungarian Olympic Committee that they withdraw Budapest’s bid to host the 2024 Olympics and Paralympics.

The text of the Government decision approved at Wednesday’s Cabinet meeting states the following: “The Olympic Games are an issue of national importance for Budapest and for Hungary. It has long been recognised that to promote issues of national importance there is a need for consensus. This consensus existed between the country’s leadership and the political parties when the Olympic bid was submitted, and this consensus was expressed in the 92 per cent majority decision by the General Assembly of Budapest City Council and the 80 per cent majority decision by the National Assembly. In recent months, however, the unity which existed earlier has been dismantled, and the Olympics has become a party political issue. The opposition parties that have backed out of their previous commitment must be held responsible for this”.

The decision states: “Only those cities where consensus on the issue has emerged and been preserved can claim to have a chance of successfully bidding for and hosting the Olympics. Today this is still the case for Paris and Los Angeles. Since in Budapest the required unity has disintegrated, it is now inconceivable that the city could mount a successful Olympic bid. In this situation the only responsible decision is for Budapest and the Hungarian Olympic Committee to withdraw their bid to host the Olympics”.

(MTI, kormany.hu)