A Hungarian socialist party MP has been excluded from her party for appearing to have lied about obtaining bachelor’s degree in economics, it has emerged.
Ildikó Bangóné Kovács has been dropped from the ranks of the Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP) after it was proven that allegations against her having lied were true, the party announced on Saturday.
According to her CV on the Hungarian parliament’s website, Bangóné has a degree in economics, but according to the university in question, there is no relevant data in their archives to prove that.
According to her public biography, she attended the Faculty of Economics and Management at the Budapest College of Economics (BGF) and graduated in 2013.
News portal Mandiner made a public interest request to BGF’s legal successor, the Budapest University of Economics, to find out whether Bangóné had attended BGF and, if so, for how long, which examinations she had taken and when she had graduated from there. The university replied that no data on the person interviewed could be found in the archives of their study system.
In connection with the matter, the Office of the National Assembly stated that the office had no competence to verify the content of the curriculum vitae of a member of parliament and that the representative is solely responsible for its veracity.
Bangóné joined the Hungarian Socialist Party in 2003, was first a member of the county board before becoming the president of her local party in 2008. She was elected to the Hajdú-Bihar County General Assembly in the 2010 municipal elections. In 2011, she was a candidate for the MSZP in the by-elections to Püspökladány, finishing third behind Sándor Bodó from Fidesz and Jobbik. In 2012, she was elected a member of the National Presidency and the Executive Committee, and is currently the chairman of the party’s Csepel organization.
She is notorious for having called voters of the ruling conservative party “rats.” Speaking about the good result of Fidesz at the European elections, Bangóné said “If I am outspoken: there are a lot of rats in Hungary, if the rat theme has already been raised in Budapest.”
