Local services
The series of commemorations of the 1848 Revolution began with a military salute and the raising of the flag of Hungary on Kossuth Square on the 15th of March 2025 in Debrecen, in the presence of Mayor László Papp, Deputy Mayor István Puskás and Member of Parliament Lajos Kósa.
The events then continued on Petőfi Square, at the statue of the poet. After the festive and inspiring melodies of the Pipás Orchestra, the students of the Károly Kratochvil Honvéd Secondary School and College performed a poetry programme entitled Through Petőfi’s Glasses, composed by Eleonóra Böjténé Urbin, the school’s Hungarian teacher. After the festive programme, wreaths were laid at the statue’s pedestal by representatives of local and state authorities, the armed forces, political parties and civil organisations.
Following the event, the now traditional march started from Petőfi Square to Kossuth Square. The focus of this year’s commemoration was on the events of March 15, 1848, and the following days in Debrecen. The Debrecen Garrison Orchestra, the Debrecen Hajdú Dance Ensemble, the Főnix Children’s and Youth Folk Dance Ensemble, the Pipás Orchestra, the Alföld Stage, the Art Center of Faculty of Humanities of the University of Debrecen, the members of the Hajdú-Bihar County Horse and Hussar Tradition Preservation Association, and the drama students of the Ady Endre Grammar School took part in the commemoration. As part of the march, the audience could see a joint production by the members of the Alföld Stage and the Art Center of Faculty of Humanities of the University of Debrecen, in front of the County Hall, and a programme by the students of the Ady Endre Grammar School at the Old Town Hall, as well as a performance by the Hajdú and Főnix dance ensembles.
This was followed by a speech by Member of Parliament, Lajos Kósa. As he said,”The 1848 Revolution was the beginning of the struggle for freedom and self-determination. For self-determination. It is fair to assume, if we look at the 12 points, that they do indeed contain a collection and a list of the conditions for self-determination and the criteria that underpin self-determination. And then let us look at each of them: “Let there be peace”.I wonder why our ancestors said, “Let there be peace”. Because without peace there is no self-determination. To be clear as noonday, the absence of peace is war. War is about violence. There is no self-determination, there is force. The strong are right and woe to the vanquished. That is why peace is necessary for the exercise of self-determination, because in war there is no self-determination. Why is freedom necessary? Without freedom, no one can decide for themselves, no one can think for themselves. Freedom has another very important condition, as does self-determination: only those who can think in terms of self-determination, only those who otherwise have a strong identity, can be free. Without identity, we are just wandering souls. If we don’t know who we are, in relation to what we could be free, how would we orient ourselves in the world, what values could we represent. So identity and freedom are the second key issue. And the third is perhaps the most puzzling, “Let there be agreement”. After all, Hungarians of that era did not even think that there was such a thing that all Hungarians agreed on at the same time.
This sentence, interpreting the 12 points, is about creating a system, which they called a people’s representative parliament, that would develop the mechanisms and minimum of consensus that all Hungarians would agree on. This is the basis of self-determination. We could say that there should be consensus, that is the basis of the demand for a democratic system. And if our ancestors, whom we now remember, fought for self-determination with oppressors, like the Hungarian king, then perhaps it is worth looking at where we stand with self-determination today. Today, one of our greatest political struggles is the fight for self-determination, just as it was then. Let us not forget that every generation must fight for its own freedom and self-determination. Self-determination is not given to anyone as a gift. Everyone must fight for it, individually, as a community, as a nation. Let us look at the current state of self-determination in Europe, let us look at the conditions.
Peace. Today, Europe is clearly pro-war. This is, by the way, a gross violation of the principle of self-determination, because if we consider that war is the embodiment of violence, then how will any kind of self-determination prevail here? The European Union is not even striving for this, it is clearly pro-war. Here, the self-determination of smaller nations, the weaker ones, is not even raised or discussed. Let’s look at freedom. Unfortunately, we are also in a very bad position when it comes to freedom, if we consider that today individual freedom is very severely restricted in many European countries. We know that freedom, freedom of the press, freedom of speech are concepts that go hand in hand, this is not happening in Europe today. It is very rare to find a country where people can enjoy freedom if they have a different opinion. Because if they have an opinion that is part of the mainstream, they can express it freely, but if they have an opinion that is different from it, they are subject to the harshest retribution. And let’s look at the consensus, that is, the issue of democracy in Europe. We must say that we have never been in such a bad position in Europe when it comes to democracy as we are now. Just think about how it has become completely customary in Europe to simply ignore some or the vast majority of people’s opinions. There are hundreds of examples of how this is happening in everyday life. Just think about the presidential election results of a neighboring country being suddenly canceled, and then the most likely candidate is excluded from the race. It doesn’t matter what our opinion is about that person, iit could be bad.” “But democracy is about excluding someone we don’t like, not arguing with them?” Lajos Kósa raised the question. “Let’s think about what happened in the Netherlands in the early 2000s,” he continued. “We almost didn’t notice that when the Dutch put the question of the association agreement with the EU, the association agreement with Ukraine to a referendum, the Dutch opinion was clearly negative. What did the Dutch parliament do?
Regardless, they voted for Ukraine’s association, but abolished the institution of referendums, saying that they were unnecessary in a democracy. Or think about what happens to parties that represent 20-30 percent of the electorate and do not share the same views as the mainstream. So they are pushed out of everywhere, quarantined, and replaced by governments that do not show even a minimum of stability in Europe, from France to Germany. We have never been so bad at democracy. And after all this, what can be said about self-determination? Once upon a time, the European Union was created as an alliance of strong, self-determined, self-conscious nations. Today, a world empire is being built before our eyes. I would add that the world empire is more like a caricature of itself. And why is self-determination important? Does this affect us here in Debrecen? Very seriously! Just think, it wasn’t that long ago when Hungary didn’t have a strong national government that advocated self-determination, what kind of fate did we have then? Whatever the outside world pointed out, we simply privatised. When fate brought it that way, the IMF wrote down the program points for the Bajnai government based on which they took away the 13th month pension, the 13th month salary, and the child and family support systems. It affects us very, very seriously if we are not self-determined and not free. That is why it is a key issue for the Hungarian nation to understand, not only by commemorating March 15, 1948, that without self-determination there is no Hungarian freedom, no Hungarian prosperity, Hungary cannot go from 5 to 6, it cannot satisfy the needs of its citizens. Then the foreign countries will come, then those who come from the capital of any country will come, and what they want will happen. If we do not want this, then we will always and always try to win self-determination for ourselves and we will try to enforce it in order to always serve the good of the Hungarian nation.” “This is what ’48 served, this was founded by the founding sentence of the 12 points that there should be peace, freedom and agreement. So be it!” Lajos Kósa. concluded.
On Kossuth Square, the celebrants were greeted with a programme entitled “Pictures of Debrecen from 1848-49” by the actors of the Csokonai National Theatre: Eszter Balázs-Bécsi, Márk Komlódy, Gergő Nagyidai, István Papp, Bence Pálóczi, Kinga Újhelyi and the actor of the nation, Sándor Csikos. The programme was put together by the Artistic Director of the Csokonai National Theatre in Debrecen, Dániel Halasi.
To close the ceremony, representatives of local government and state bodies, armed forces, as well as political parties and civil organisations laid their wreaths at the Kossuth statue.
The Debrecen celebrations on the 15th of March ended with the lowering of the Hungarian flag on Kossuth Square.
Source and photo credit: debrecen.hu
