On 24 February 2016, Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbán announced his government will hold a referendum on whether to accept the European Union’s proposed mandatory quotas for relocating migrants.

The referendum was deemed valid by the Hungarian constitutional court, and a vote is scheduled on October 2.

Ahead of the vote, Orbán ramped up rhetoric to the point of calling for a round-up of migrants and exportation to Africa.

orban-fence

Please consider Viktor Orban Calls for ‘Round-Up’ of Migrants in EU

“Those who came illegally must be rounded up and shipped out,” Mr Orban said in an interview released on Thursday by news website Origo.hu. He suggested an estimated 1.5m refugees and migrants who arrived on the continent last year should be sent to “an island or somewhere in north Africa” where European forces would enforce order. “That will solve all the problems,” he said.

“It’s the only solution that will work for everyone; for those of us who are not yet in trouble, because we protected ourselves. And also for countries like Germany, who are already in trouble,” he said. “The answer is to take [migrants] out of the union.”

Hungary sealed its border with Serbia last September, choking off the main route of migration into the EU via the western Balkans and diverting the flow westwards through Slovenia and Croatia. Other EU countries have since followed suit, although a German-sponsored EU deal with Turkey to reduce the influx of migrants has led to a drop in arrivals.

Mr Orban also took aim at Angela Merkel’s mea culpa this week, in which the German chancellor expressed regret that she could not “turn back the clock” to improve the country’s preparedness before she in effect welcomed in hundreds of thousands of migrants last year.

While her comments have been welcomed by some critics in Germany, the Hungarian premier suggested there was little substance behind them.

“What can I say about the German politicians and their policies?” he said. “I also would like to turn back the clock — what a great idea. But the problem is that it’s not possible.”

Merkel’s Alleged Mea Culpa

After a third place finish to AfD in her own state in recent German elections, then another big drubbing but a second place finish in Berlin, Merkel supposedly issued a Mea Culpa Aimed at Wooing Back Voters.

This was followed up with a message She Would Turn Back the Clock on Refugee Policy.

The “Mea Culpa” and the “turn back the clock” ideas are a complete crock of bullsheet. Pay attention to the exact phrasing:

“If I could, I would rewind time by many, many years so that I could better prepare myself and the whole government and all those in positions of responsibility for the situation that caught us unprepared in the late summer of 2015,” Ms Merkel said.

The chancellor also distanced herself from her phrase — “Wir schaffen das — we can do it” — which captured Germans’ belief last summer in their capacity to integrate the newly arrived refugees. She said it had become “a simple slogan, almost an empty formula” that underestimated the scale of the integration challenge.

The admission was aimed at winning back voters who have flocked to the rightwing, populist Alternative for Germany party, which has made big inroads this year by criticising Ms Merkel’s open-door approach to refugees. She was also responding to the growing ranks of conservative critics in her ruling CDU/CSU bloc, who have urged her to complement recent moves to tighten refugee policy with a more self-critical tone.

“The government has been on the right track with its policies for some time now. But our communication must be better,” said one CDU MP. “The chancellor seems now to have accepted this.”

Disingenuous Blather

What a joke. In Merkel’s Time Machine, she did not seek to undo her foolish decision to welcome refugees with open arms. Rather, she wanted go back further, “many years”, to be precise, to prepare for migration onslaught.

Her highness has not figured out that no amount of preparation could ever work!

Even if she was brilliant enough to be prepared, the other countries on the route would not have been. And of course Germany could never have prepared in the first place.

Why?

Because there is an endless demand for free handouts. Had Germany prepared for 1 million refugees, 5 million would have arrived.

Germany on Right Track Now?

Anyone placated by Merkel’s disingenuous “mea culpa” is a fool.

Her CDU party says “The government has been on the right track with its policies for some time now. But our communication must be better.”

That’s a crock of BS as well.

For starters, the flood of migrants dramatically slowed the moment Hungary and the Balkan states sealed there borders. Merkel takes credit for something Orbán accomplished.

Secondly, if the EU approves Turkey’s demand for visa-free access for 80 million Turks, another flood of migrants will be coming right up.

That said, Orbán is more than a bit off base. You can’t just take millions of migrants and dump them in Africa.

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Mike “Mish” Shedlock