The writer and literary translator

The inaugural address of Árpád Göncz on the occasion of his election as President of the Republic - Hungarian Parliament on 3 August 1990

Allow me to begin by thanking you for electing me president. It is a great pleasure to see that all the parties in the House as well as the group of independents have agreed to my nomination, since they, as the free elections clearly show, represent the overwhelming majority of the Hungarian people and so I can rightly consider myself as having been elected not only by Parliament but by the country as a whole.

Perhaps it would have been a more eloquent expression of my support if I had been elected directly by the people themselves, but I feel that the office of President could hardly have borne yet another month of temporariness without serious damage to its authority. It would have damaged the political stability of the nation.

But let me say as well that I know that this nomination, however unanimous, is not so much for me as for the individuals of our recent history, some of whom I have worked with, some of whom I have been in prison with, whose names mark the milestones of my political life, and whom, if they were still alive, I would welcome as worthier than myself to the Office of the President of the new Hungarian Republic.

Defenders of the Hungarian nation's independence such as the martyred leader of the Hungarian Students' Freedom Front, Endre Bajcsy-Zsilinszky, the director of the Peasant League, Sándor Kiss, who was tortured in the Margitkörút prison, or the former secretary general of the Independent Smallholders' Party, Béla Kovács, who was deported and imprisoned for many years in Vorkuta, or the martyred Prime Minister of the 1956 revolution Imre Nagy, or like István Bibó, in whom the noblest democratic ideals, Christian patience and patriotism, and the independence of the citoyen was embodied, like Ferenc Donáth, the tireless bridge-builder until his death, the heir to the best traditions of the March Front, or like the communist and non-communist participants of the resistance who sacrificed their lives for our national independence. Or like István Angyal and János Bárány who shed their blood in the 1956 street fights, and ended their lives on the gallows – all of them would have been worthier than I.

Perhaps this list of names of my former teachers, comrades and friends proves that I am not and cannot be a servant of parties or party interests. All my life, in and out of parties, I have served and will continue to serve the independence of the nation, the freedom of thought and speech, the concept of freedom of faith in a free country, and the defence of social justice as manifest in human rights without discrimination or exclusion. I will serve Hungarian democracy, which is maturing even now in party debates. I will serve the future --- the future that the two victorious Hungarian revolutions of 1848, the liberation struggle of the serfs, and, that of 1956, the liberation struggle of the workers, both of which were trampled underfoot in the fullness of their victory, and which represent the democracy that we still have yet to fully realise.

Throughout my life, which has been a roller-coaster ride, I have had the good fortune to experience the fate of the worker, the peasant and the free intellectual first hand. I am not, therefore, suited to be a forger of narrow class interests. If I wish to serve anyone, I will serve those who have no servants: the defenceless. Those who have not been given a good word either in the crane-feathered gentry world or in the world of equals in which some were ’more equal’, those who are not competitive in a competitive society, those who have no means to defend themselves, and who, therefore, need protection the most.

         And finally, let me say that I am not afraid of controversy. I have never hidden my opinion, and nor will I hide it in the future for it is through controversy that the truth is revealed. And I have always trusted and continue to trust in the power of truth --- just as much as I trust that the Hungarian people are perfectly mature for democracy. They recognise and are capable of safeguarding their interests and their beliefs and as has been proven over and over again recently, their judgement is sure-fire, and they will express it in words as well as  in deeds. I have every reason to believe that the Hungarian people have a bright future ahead. It is in this belief that I have the courage to accept your honourable mandate to be – along with you – the servant of the future.