Part I — Situation overview

On Saturday 5 September 2026 the Prime Minister announced on his social media page that after the reshaping of the tobacco and casino concessions, the review of the 35-year motorway concession comes next. The announcement itself was short, but the case behind it is one of the largest items in the Hungarian public finance system. In 2022 the previous government granted a concession for 35 years over most of the domestic expressway network: the winner was Magyar Koncessziós Infrastruktúra Fejlesztő Zrt. (MKIF), a consortium made up of private equity funds. More about its ownership background could only be learned after Szabad Európa forced the release of the contract’s annexes through litigation: the private equity funds are linked to Lőrinc Mészáros and László Szíjj. According to the July statement of the minister for transport and investment, the value of the contract projected over the full term is some 24 trillion forints, and the contract handed the concessionaire the right to operate and develop almost every Hungarian motorway. Over the past four years the state has paid out 1,024 billion forints to the concessionaire; the minister called this a “brutal, incomprehensible” figure, and put it this way: “on the basis of what we have seen, this is in fact not a concession but an instrument for channelling public money away”.

The case has a prehistory, and it did not begin with the change of government. The European Commission opened infringement proceedings over the concession as early as 2022: according to its reasoning the contract was not transparent as regards the estimated contract value, does not transfer operating risk to the concessionaire to a sufficient degree, and runs for an unjustifiably long period — that is, it breaches EU law. In August the government already intervened on a detached section: the operation of the roughly 60-kilometre stretch of the M6 between Dunaújváros and Érdi-tető would have been entrusted by the former minister for construction and investment to a company belonging to the concessionaire for 11 years, with a framework sum of 149 billion forints. The new government regards this decision as legally invalid, the task is performed for 44 billion forints by the service provider that has operated the section all along, and the ministry has filed a criminal complaint over the overpricing. This week the government also announced a proposal to abolish the veto right of the Supervisory Authority for Regulated Activities, which oversees concession contracts; indeed the abolition of the authority itself has been raised. The proportions are illuminated most sharply by another figure: according to the minister, in 2025 MKIF received 410 billion forints from the state for 1,200 kilometres of motorway, while barely 100 billion forints went to maintaining the 30,000-kilometre national road network. Today close to 20,000 kilometres of national road are awaiting renovation.

MIAK’s reading: the review is professionally well founded, but the form of the announcement runs counter to what the review is trying to achieve. Terminating a 35-year commitment worth 24 trillion forints is not a genre for a social media announcement but for a procedure. The real fault of the present arrangement is not that the “wrong company” got it, but that the contract’s term is longer, its risk-sharing more disproportionate and its publicity narrower than what is defensible for an item of this size. If the termination takes place on the same discretionary basis as the award, then the structure of the system remains unchanged: the discretion remains, only in different hands. This is MIAK’s yardstick in this case — not who the beneficiary is, but whether there is a rule known in advance for the decision.

Part II — Foundations in the literature

Three sources give the interpretive frame. In his work Controlling Corruption, Robert Klitgaard (American economist, one of the founding authors of corruption research, professor at Claremont Graduate University) describes corruption not as a moral but as a structural category: it appears where a monopoly position and wide discretion meet weak accountability — the motorway concession is affected in all three dimensions. The volume Corruption and Government by Susan Rose-Ackerman (American lawyer-economist, professor at Yale, a leading researcher of the institutional economics of corruption) describes the particular risk of long-term state concessions. A long term and the absence of legal certainty together provoke conduct in the concessionaire that prefers short-term gain to long-term maintenance. And the book Globalization and Its Discontents by Joseph E. Stiglitz (American economist, Nobel laureate in economics, former chief economist of the World Bank) names the main risk of the present decision: handing over a monopoly without a competition and regulatory authority does not abolish the monopoly, it merely changes its owner. The three authors lead to the same place: the problem of the concession system is structural, therefore the solution has to be structural as well. The detailed treatment of the literature — author by author, with quotations — can be found in section 6.4 Literature in detail.

Part III — MIAK’s concrete proposal

MIAK proposes three measurable steps. The starting point is that a substantive review of the case is warranted: an EU infringement procedure, disproportionate risk-sharing and an extremely long term are together sufficient reason to reopen the contract. The proposals therefore are not against the review but for its procedural foundation.

3.1 Full publication of the concession contract and all its annexes (within 30 days)

The government should publish the full text of the 2022 concession contract, together with all its annexes, its fee formula and its amendments to date, in machine-readable form. This step is legally feasible today: the contract contains data of public interest, and part of the annexes has already been extracted through litigation by an editorial office — that is, the court decided in favour of publicity, only the legislator has not drawn the general conclusion from it. Publication is not a symbolic step but a precondition of termination: as long as the contractual terms are not known, neither the legal risk nor the price of termination can be judged from outside, and the government’s own reasoning cannot be checked either. In the Klitgaard frame this is precisely the strengthening of the accountability factor — the only one of the three that can be improved by a unilateral government decision, without any consideration in return. The proposal is a direct application of MIAK’s programme points A1 (Public money dashboard) and A2 (Public procurement transparency).

3.2 Concession review protocol: criteria, independent evaluation, exit cost estimate (within 90 days)

The government should set down in a decree the procedure in which it reviews a concession contract with a term longer than ten years. The protocol should consist of four elements: (1) evaluation criteria fixed in advance — value for money in market comparison, the actual service level, the ratio of risk-sharing, the contract’s compliance with EU law; (2) the evaluation should be carried out by an independent panel of experts separate from the contracting ministry, and its report should be public; (3) every proposal for termination or renegotiation should be accompanied by an exit cost estimate that sets out item by item the compensation risk, the expected length and cost of the legal dispute, and the funding needs of the interim operation; (4) the itemised setting down of grounds for termination at the level of statute — this should be submitted by the Government to Parliament as a bill, because a government decree may not provide for it — so that future governments cannot reach into contracts on the basis of free discretion. The third point is the most important and the most uncomfortable: the gross sum of the saving is easy to announce, but the net balance can only be judged together with the exit cost. This proposal is the concretisation of programme points G6 (Programme against rent-seeking and regulatory capture) and G20 (Economic policy impact assessment system) for this group of instruments.

3.3 The competition rules of the successor model before the termination is declared

Ending the concession does not in itself answer the question of who will operate the road network and on what terms. Stiglitz’s argument (see 6.4.3) is directly applicable here: if the step that dismantles the monopoly position is not preceded by a functioning competition and regulatory framework, then the result is not competition but a change of owner. MIAK therefore proposes that three questions should be settled simultaneously with the termination decision — not afterwards: into how many sections, with what term and under what fee regulation the operation is put back on the market; who exercises supervision over contractual performance if the veto right of the current supervisory authority is abolished; and to what minimum service level (pavement condition, winter operation, response time for road safety interventions) the remuneration is tied. The question of competence is particularly important: abolishing the veto right of a supervisory body does not in itself improve accountability, only if the competence is transferred elsewhere in an identifiable way. The proposal carries over to road operation the logic of programme points G5 (Competition policy and anti-monopoly) and KO4 (Rail development with data-based priorities).

The three proposals are bound together by a single principle: the termination of a long-term commitment is an institutional improvement only if the procedure by which it is terminated is stricter than the one by which it was concluded. If it is looser or the same, then termination does not close the pattern but continues it — only the direction is reversed.

Part IV — Expected effects and risks

Dimension Expected effect Risk
Budget The fall in the concession fee payments of several hundred billion forints a year could give lasting room for manoeuvre for network maintenance The exit cost — compensation, legal dispute, interim operation — could stretch the appearance of the net saving over years
Road network and territorial accessibility The ratio of funding between the expressway and the minor road network could even out; the 20,000 kilometres of road awaiting renovation could become a priority During the transitional period investment decisions could be postponed and pavement condition could deteriorate further
Investor confidence A public set of criteria makes it predictable when and on what basis the state reaches into a long-term contract Termination without criteria builds a risk premium into every long-term infrastructure contract — and in the end this too is paid by the budget
Institutional system The chance of closing the EU infringement procedure grows if the settlement answers the Commission’s objections Abolishing the veto right of the supervisory authority could leave a gap in competence if the task is not transferred elsewhere in an identifiable way

The main question of judgement is the sequencing of timing and publicity. The government has now started with the announcement, while the publication of the contract and the exit cost estimate are not yet available — this is the reverse of the order MIAK proposes. That is not in itself a mistake: signalling political intent in advance also creates a negotiating position. It becomes a risk if publication and the protocol fail to follow, because the announcement has been made and the political pressure has eased. The second point of judgement is the relationship between the EU procedure and the Hungarian termination: the infringement procedure disputes the lawfulness of the contract, which is an argument for the Hungarian side in favour of termination — but the same argument can be used on the concessionaire’s side in a compensation dispute if the termination does not take place in a documented procedure built on the EU objections. It therefore matters on what legal ground and with what evidence the termination happens.

Part V — Measurability and summary

5.1 What is worth following? (suggested KPIs)

The performance indicators below (KPIs, Key Performance Indicators) are suggestions, not government decisions — MIAK considers them suitable for judging in 12 and 24 months’ time what the review has delivered:

  • The share of contractual documents made public: what percentage of the concession contract and its annexes is publicly accessible, without redaction on grounds of business secrecy. Suggested target: 100 per cent for the parts concerning the fee formula and the service level.
  • The net balance: the annual saving achieved on the termination minus the exit cost (compensation, procedural costs, interim operation) — published annually, not just the gross sum.
  • The maintenance funding ratio: the ratio of state spending on the expressway network to that on the 30,000-kilometre national road network. This indicator tells whether the saving really goes to the neglected part of the network.
  • The length of the road network awaiting renovation: the change in the current stock of close to 20,000 kilometres. This is the outcome indicator that the driver actually perceives.

5.2 Summary

MIAK’s request can be summed up in a single sentence: before declaring the termination the government should publish the contract, and should set down in a decree in what procedure and at what exit cost a long-term concession may be terminated. The substantive reasons for the review are there — an EU infringement procedure, disproportionate risk-sharing, and the order-of-magnitude difference between network maintenance and the concession fee payments. What is missing is not the reason but the procedure.

Two MIAK foundational values are at play here. Transparency, because treating a commitment running for 35 years and worth several trillion forints as a business secret is indefensible in itself — regardless of who the contracting party is, and regardless of whether the contract is terminated. And being non-ideological, because MIAK applies the same yardstick to the termination as it applied to the award: if concluding a long-term contract without criteria and publicity was open to objection, then so is ending it. A government that today tears up a contract without a rule will tomorrow have difficulty invoking a rule when somebody else concludes one.

Part VI — Reasoning and further sources

6.1 The framing of the press by spectrum

The liberal-left and public affairs band read the announcement as a continuation of the settling of accounts with the previous government’s business circles, but there was a noticeable difference between the papers in how much institutional background they added. Telex went deepest: alongside the announcement it recalled the circumstances of the 2022 award, the uncovering of the ownership background through litigation, the three concrete grounds of the European Commission’s infringement procedure, and the point that the new construction and lane widening carried out by the concessionaire cost several times the price usual in the concessions of middle-income countries. 444.hu framed it most precisely from a news-value point of view: it pointed out that the decisions on the tobacco and casino concessions had already been set out by the head of government two days earlier, so the only genuine novelty is the motorway strand. 24.hu highlighted the figures — the contract value of 24 trillion and the 1,024 billion forints paid out over the past four years. HVG connected the announcement to the disproportionality of network financing, and this was the most substantive policy framing among the day’s materials.

The economic band remained factual: Portfolio took over the news agency material, but with its related articles it showed the long prehistory of the case — from the M6 criminal complaint through the concessionaire’s public response to earlier savings estimates. The conservative band put on its front page not the announcement but one of its consequences: Magyar Nemzet wrote that the operation of the M6 is going to a company with Austrian-Dutch background, and that the government decision excluded the firm with Hungarian interests — that is, the framing became the contrast between the foreign owner and the Hungarian company, not a comparison of contractual terms. Mandiner set out the full decision package of Wednesday’s cabinet meeting, including the planned abolition of the supervisory authority’s veto right; this detail received less attention at the other papers, even though from a competence point of view it is one of the most important elements of the news. ATV’s video summary highlighted the general character of the decision. According to the monitor’s source markings, the materials of Index and Népszava were available only at title level (title-level reference only).

One feature is common to all three bands: the gross sum of the saving appears in every paper, the expected cost of the termination in none. This is not an editorial omission — the figure is simply not available. This is precisely why MIAK proposes making the exit cost estimate mandatory: as long as the public sees only one side, the judgement of the decision necessarily remains political.

6.2 Facts and data

Data Value Level of evidence
Conclusion and term of the concession contract 2022, 35 years contractual fact, consistent across several papers
The value of the contract projected over the full term some 24 trillion forints ministerial statement (July 2026)
The sum paid to the concessionaire over the past four years 1,024 billion forints ministerial statement, consistent across several papers
The sum paid to the concessionaire in 2025 410 billion forints for 1,200 km of expressway ministerial statement
The sum available in 2025 for maintaining the national road network some 100 billion forints for 30,000 km ministerial statement
National road awaiting renovation close to 20,000 km ministerial statement
The 11-year operation of the detached section of the M6 44 billion forints instead of 149 billion forints ministerial statement; the difference is 105 billion forints
EU infringement procedure over the concession ongoing since 2022 European Commission

Two remarks on the data. First, the contract value of 24 trillion is a nominal sum projected over 35 years — it is not annual expenditure and not present value; in the media it often appears without context, which gives rise to misunderstanding. Second — and this is the more important point — the great majority of the figures above are ministerial statements, without independent verification. This does not mean they are inaccurate; it means that at present there is nothing to measure them against, because the contract itself is not public. This is the practical reason for proposal 3.1.

6.3 Policy dimensions

  • Transport and infrastructure (programme points) — data-based ranking of operating and development funds, the funding ratio between the expressway and the minor road network (programme point ID: KO4);
  • Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points) — the register of long-term commitments and contract publicity (programme point ID: A1, A2);
  • Economy (programme points) — action against rent-seeking, the competition-policy successor model and mandatory ex-post impact assessment (programme point ID: G5, G6, G20);
  • Economy (background material) — the principle of systematic, zero-based review of state expenditure (programme point ID: G21).

A clarification of competences for the sake of public debate: terminating a concession contract is a question of civil law, decided in case of dispute by a court or — depending on the contractual stipulation — by an arbitration tribunal, not by the government. The government’s decision records the intention to terminate and its legal ground; whether the termination was lawful and whether compensation is due for it is established later in a legal dispute. Likewise: following the criminal complaint over the overpricing, the procedure falls within the competence of the investigating authority and then the prosecution service, while criminal liability is decided by a court — with the complaint the ministry initiates a procedure, it does not establish liability.

6.4 Literature in detail

6.4.1 Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption

Klitgaard derives corruption not from the character of the actors but from the structure of the situation. According to the relation he sets up, the risk of abuse arises from the conjunction of three factors: a monopoly position, wide discretion and weak accountability.

“Illicit behavior flourishes when agents have monopoly power over clients, when agents have great discretion, and when accountability of agents to the principal is weak. A stylized equation holds: CORRUPTION = MONOPOLY + DISCRETION − ACCOUNTABILITY”

Another finding of the book, even more important for the present case, is that transfer into private hands does not in itself improve the situation: if the monopoly position and the discretion remain, the consumer continues to pay too high a price — regardless of whether the service is in state or private hands. The Hungarian motorway concession shows exactly this pattern: a monopoly position over the entire expressway network, wide discretion at the award and at contract amendment, and weak accountability, because the terms of the contract are not public. The order of MIAK’s proposals also follows from the Klitgaard frame: the monopoly position and the discretion can only be changed with a new contractual structure, whereas accountability can be improved immediately, with a single publication decision — which is why one has to begin with the publicity of the contract.

📖 Source: Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption

6.4.2 Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government

Rose-Ackerman devotes a separate chapter to the award of large state contracts and concessions, and her most important observation for the present case is that a long-term concession distorts the concessionaire’s conduct even if the contract is economical in itself. The key is legal certainty: if the concessionaire fears that its contract will be torn up for political reasons, it optimises for short-term gain.

“The operative terms are secure and long-term. […] the concessionaire (or contractor) may fear that those in power are vulnerable to overthrow […] A new regime may not honor the old one’s commitments.”

The author also points out that the characteristic form of harm in concessions is not open bribery but a right awarded at an underpriced or disproportionately favourable set of terms: the revenue that should flow into the budget stays with the private actor. This applies to both sides of the Hungarian case. On the one hand it explains why the 35-year term and the disproportionate risk-sharing were risky from the outset — this is exactly what the European Commission objects to as well. On the other hand it is a warning as regards termination: if a contract is torn up without criteria and procedure, that builds not confidence but a risk premium among future bidders, and the premium likewise burdens the budget. MIAK’s proposal 3.2 — public criteria, independent evaluation, exit cost estimate — is meant precisely to neutralise this effect.

📖 Source: Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government — Causes, Consequences, and Reform

6.4.3 Joseph E. Stiglitz: Globalization and Its Discontents

From the experience of the transition economies of the nineties Stiglitz derives the rule of sequencing that is directly applicable to the present decision: a change of owner does not substitute for a competition and regulatory framework.

“privatizing a monopoly before an effective competition or regulatory authority was in place might simply replace a government monopoly with a private monopoly, even more ruthless in exploiting the consumer.”

The author’s more general thesis is the same one about sequencing: a good part of the failures of reform stemmed not from the direction but from the timing — market opening preceded the setting up of regulatory institutions. The Hungarian case is the reverse reading of this: here it is the ending of the concession, not its creation, that is on the agenda, but the sequencing risk is the same. If the termination precedes the settlement of the competition rules of the successor model and of supervisory competence — while the abolition of the current supervisory body’s veto right is being prepared right now — then the network enters an unregulated transitional period. MIAK’s proposal 3.3 follows from this: it should be decided simultaneously with the termination decision who operates, with what term, under what fee regulation and under what supervision.

📖 Source: Joseph E. Stiglitz: Globalization and Its Discontents

6.5 International comparison (where relevant)

The renegotiation of long-term road concessions is not a Hungarian peculiarity: according to international experience a significant proportion of infrastructure concessions are renegotiated at least once during their term, typically in the first few years. Two institutional patterns have proved themselves. One is the mandatory public contract register: in Slovakia, since 2011 the publication of every state contract has been a condition of its entry into force — MIAK’s programme point A1 is also built on this pattern — so a review never starts from a lack of information. The other is independent project supervision: the infrastructure supervisory office operating in the United Kingdom since 2016 publishes the status of every large state investment publicly, with a red-amber-green classification, and according to the assessment of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) this has contributed to an improvement in project selection and cost control. The common element: both solutions regulate the phase before and after contracting, not just the moment of scandal. The direction of EU law points the same way — the concessions directive requires the actual transfer of risk and a proportionate term, and the infringement procedure opened in the Hungarian case objects to the contract on exactly these two points. MIAK’s proposals therefore do not mean an additional requirement but the translation of an existing EU expectation into a domestic procedure.

Transparency and anti-corruption policy

  • A1 — Public money dashboard
  • A2 — Public procurement transparency

Economy

  • G5 — Competition policy and anti-monopoly
  • G6 — Programme against rent-seeking and regulatory capture
  • G19 — Radical transparency in economic decision-making
  • G20 — Economic policy impact assessment system
  • G21 — Systematic review of state expenditure

Transport and infrastructure

  • KO4 — Rail development with data-based priorities

Suggested new programme point: Concession review protocol — public criteria, independent evaluation and a mandatory exit cost estimate for contracts with a term longer than ten years — for the Economy area.

6.7 List of sources

Press sources (MIAK press monitor, 6 September 2026 — topic 1):

Knowledge base references (specialist books):

  • 📖 Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption
  • 📖 Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government — Causes, Consequences, and Reform
  • 📖 Joseph E. Stiglitz: Globalization and Its Discontents

MIAK internal materials:

  • MIAK policy area: Transport and infrastructure (programme points; programme point ID: KO4)
  • MIAK policy area: Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points; programme point ID: A1, A2)
  • MIAK policy area: Economy (programme points; programme point ID: G5, G6, G19, G20, G21)
  • MIAK press monitor, 6 September 2026 — topic 1, score: 94/100

Supplementary public data sources (where used):

  • European Commission — register of infringement procedures
  • Magyar Közlöny — the government decisions concerning the concessions

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