We, Hungarians in Romania, reckon that the European Union – our Union – will, in the near future, become a Europe of regions and communities. It will be a Union based upon our trust in our own resources. A Union within which the greatest part of the Hungarian nation will come together again and communities living side by side as pieces of a mosaic will preserve their specific heritage, language and culture.

Our Union relies upon these varied communities, upon dialogue, upon mutual respect and the principle of tolerance. As we see it, the European Union has human dignity, liberty, democracy, the principle of the state of law and human rights as its corner-stones. Our Europe stands out through pluralism, existential security, solidarity and the lack of any form of discrimination. In our Europe, being a Hungarian residing in Romania presents no handicap.

The European Union stands at the crossroads, we are all aware of it. The failure of the European Constitution, the delay of the Reform Treaty of Lisbon and the economic crisis will trigger harsh debates regarding the future of the European Union. During the next five years, the citizens, communities, regions, countries and institutions of the Union will have to decide: how would the European Union they want to live in look like. We, Hungarians in Romania will have to take part in these debates. We are the only ones in a position to present the kind of Europe we envisage for our children and ourselves. Nobody but our elected Mps can properly represent our values and interests.

According to Jean Monnet, founding father of the Union, the union is one between people and not states, its main objective being to eschew all barriers dividing the peoples of Europe. After the member states had delegated part of their sovereignty to the institutes of the Union, it became clear that the national states of the twentieth century were quite short of solutions for the most important issues of the day. The European national state cannot provide a proper framework for ethnic minorities; neither can it generate solutions for the problems of globalization, nor for the consequences of the economic crisis.

Our Union represents the interests of its citizens, of its communities and regions and of its member states. The institutions of the European Union enhance the competitiveness of all of its members. Our Union has the implementation of the knowledge-based society at its core. 

We have joined the European Union two years ago. We cannot afford to be content with our simple accession. We need to live up to the standards of the Union. We need to exploit the possibilities of the European market and to channel the assistance at our disposal within the Union.

In our view, micro-regional and regional partnerships are at the bases of economic development, representing a form of cooperation of local administrative bodies that enhances the chances for access to European Structural and Cohesion Funds. We need to enhance micro-regional partnerships and to reconsider the existing development regions. In determining the new development regions, we will have to take into account the expectations of the region in question in terms of economic development, also the ethnic, cultural and historical characteristics of its inhabitants. These regions will overtake some of the competences of central authorities and will have leading bodies constituted through elections. We see the Romanians and other ethnic communities in Transylvania as our strategic partners in representing the regional interests of Transylvania. Near-border and cross-border programs have a special role in using community funds offered by European institutions.

Being its rightful members, our task is to mould the Union. We support the transformation of community agricultural policies in what pertains to the interests of Hungarian farmers.
Our Europe is based on the principle of subsidiarity and has the human element in its centre. Our Europe exists for the sake of man, of the European citizen.

We must bring Europe to the young; we must create possibilities for the young to reach Europe. For Hungarian young people in Transylvania, Europe signifies liberty and chance. It signifies free travel and a chance for quality, competitive education, for perfection, individual development, employment and for a decent future.

Romania’s accession to the European Union opened new perspectives in what regards welfare society and the safeguarding of rights for ethnic minorities. The moment has arrived to recognize the one and a half million members’ community of Hungarians in Romania as constitutive element of the state, to recognise the Hungarian language as official language on local and regional levels. We strongly believe that the preservation and continuity of our ethnic identity is safeguarded only by certain forms of autonomy realisable by following the example of best practices recorded in several member states of the European Union.

In our view, it is absolutely necessary for the European Union to turn the best practices of its member states and the principles at the bases of the existing models of autonomy into general guidelines.

The forms of autonomy defined in our program are harmonized with the specifically minority existential conditions of the Hungarian community in Romania, while they comply to constitutional requirements and to the European models of autonomy based on the principles of subsidiarity and self-government, at the origins of modern Europe. We are convinced that beyond administrative decentralization, community autonomies have also got benefits for the population in majority, consequently we expect the initiation of a dialogue with the Romanian political class and civil society in order to integrate the system of autonomies into state organization. We will suggest to the European Union the acceptance of certain norms of minority protection, through which the best practices of certain member states and various autonomy models would become standard for each member state.
 
What type of autonomy do we pursue in the Secler region? We pursue a type of territorial autonomy that would offer a uniform organizational framework to the region, securing solutions both for the specific problems of Hungarians and Romanians who live there. We pursue a Secler region that would grant conditions for employment, for the economic development of local communities and for their more competitive position on the European market. WE envisage a Secler region where leading positions in public institutions would be occupied in concordance with the ethnic proportions in the region.

What type of autonomy do we pursue? A type of cultural autonomy that would grant local authority in the domain of culture and education and would grant information in people’s mother tongue on all levels of public life. A type of cultural autonomy that would grant competence within the Romanian system of education in Hungarian for the preservation and continuity of ethnic identity, for the acquiring of competitive and accessible knowledge. We pursue a type of local cultural authority that would grant for minority communities in inter-ethnic media or for diaspora-type communities – with regard to their proportion – specific programs within state-owned or locally governed cultural institutions.

As long as there are laws governing neither cultural and territorial autonomy nor their functioning, we must create, within the existing legal and constitutional terms, institutional forms that would enhance the development of autonomy.  

What type of government do we pursue? At the level of central government, we require governmental programs that would meet – beyond the competences granted by autonomies – the economic and social needs of the Hungarian community in Romania. For safeguarding the implementation of such programs, we require the presence of individuals delegated by the Hungarian organization for representing and protecting the interest of the community at various apolitical levels of the all-time government, in conformity with the proportions of our community on national level.

Having in mind all the above we consider the realization of a Europe of regions paramount, to offer a framework for the values of the European Union – Our Union – to develop harmoniously. We are aware of the tasks we need to fulfill in implementing our vision, nevertheless it is our conviction that through cooperation, solidarity, professionalism and hard work these tasks can successfully be fulfilled.

In our Europe, the Hungarian community in Transylvania, the entire Hungarian ethnic community in Romania has equal rights, significance and competitiveness when compared to any other European community.

Our Europe is the multicultural Union of values, the Europe of regions and communities.

April the 25th 2009, Cluj-Napoca