It comes as no surprise that Belgium and Hungary are the first prominent members of the Commission’s penalty box. Both countries find themselves in politically extraordinary situations. 

Belgium is a country with 3 different language regions. On 10 million people, it has 8 parliaments and ditto governments. Its capital alone is governed by 20 different majors. Belgium’s governing structure comes close to insanity. The complexity of the country is also one of the reasons why Belgium holds the world record in government formations. Recently, after 541 days, Belgian’s deeply divided French and Flemish parties found a compromise and formed a government. That compromise is now immediately tested by the Commission’s reservations over the administration’s prospects for the national budget. Super Commissioner Oli Rehn did not blink when he decided to use his newly acquired powers over Member States’ budgets. He told the Belgian government that it departed from an overoptimistic outlook on the country’s economic growth in 2012 and summoned it to deepen its austerity programme. The Belgians, already warned last year by the merciless financial markets, started to discuss new austerity measures. 

Fiscally disciplining Belgium will not prove too difficult for the Commission. The internal complexity of the country has made Belgians one of the least Eurosceptic people in Europe. I sometimes even think they would be rather governed by the European Commission than their own politicians. 

The real test case for the Commission’s new powers comes with Hungary. The country, governed by Victor Orban, finds itself in a dramatic situation. Fidesz, the party that won a 2/3 majority in the national parliament, has a free hand in determining the country’s future. Besides politicizing most of the country’s independent institutions (think of the central bank or the constitutional court) and banning media that openly criticizes it, the Orban machine is steering the country into an economic disaster.

Last year, the European Commission showed its unease with Orban’s plan to levy a crisis tax on all major companies in order to fight the mounting budget deficit. Orban waived the critics away, thereby openly challenging Europe’s executive. Earlier in the year, he had refused an emergency loan from the IMF in the name of Hungary’s national interests. Nobody was going to tell him what to do.

Last week, however, the Orban administration had to come back on its plan to reduce the political  independence of the national bank, after serious warnings from the European Commission.

Without the support of the European Union, Orban stands no chance in securing a new emergency loan, without which Hungary could face a Greek tragedy. As a first step, Hungary should cooperate with the Commission and rewrite its budget plans for this year. 

The Commission is persistent and shows no fear to use its new powers. Powers that are real, but only if the Member State under scrutiny cooperates. It is unsure if the incalculable nationalist Orban will follow this path. 

This promises to be a serious case and will be a litmus test for the Commission’s authority under the new enforcement rules. The risk that a Euro-sceptic Orban will be disobedient and use the Commission’s dictate for populist causes is very likely. Orban might say that the Commission is blocking the country’s economic development and isolate himself and the Hungarian citizens further from the European Union. 

Next to being the first enforcement dossiers under the new SGP rules, the cases of Belgium and Hungary stand symbol for the weakness of the Commission’s new powers. It only works well for those member states that are cooperating. For Eurosceptic and economically weak countries it might escalate into political disaster.

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