A fact-checking group claiming to be independent has received significant EU funds under unclear selection criteria, as V4NA had reported earlier. However, it's turned out that the group active around the micro-blog is rather far from being independent. In the latest part of our series we present the financial and political empire in the background.

The Lakmusz portal is financed through Magyar Jeti Zrt, the publisher of 444. The portal itself reveals this by naming this firm as its publisher in the imprint.

Magyar Jeti’s report for 2021 also confirms this in the Supplementary Appendix, which says „establising and operating the fact-checking site lakmusz.hu” in explanation of the funds awarded by the EU Commission under the 2020 Work Program on the Financing of Pilot Projects and Preparatory Actions in the field of „Communications Networks, Content and Technology”. We have already discussed the details and contradictions regarding the above support from the European Commission in the previous parts of our series.

In this part of its article series, V4NA looks at the exact financing structure of Magyar Jeti Zrt, the publisher of both 444 and Lakmusz.

In an article published last year, Kontra.hu reported that Magyar Jeti Zrt and the paper it publishes, are so independent that in 2014, a year after its establishment, the company sold shares – through the New York-based Digital News Ventures LLC – to

the Media Development Investment Fund, which is part of US oligarch George Soros’s media empire. The organisation, active in 39 countries,

receives huge sums from Mr Soros’s foundation. With this acquisition not only the ownership structure changed, but Mr Soros’s direct subordinates – namely Valer Kot and Marie Nemcova – also appeared as board members.

Marie Nemcova worked as programme director at the Open Society Fund Prague, Mr Soros’s Czech agency, and is currently active as chief operating officer at Media Development Investment Fund, a media foundation – with links to the stock exchange speculator – expanding its network in Europe.

The other person sitting on the board of Magyar Jeti, Valter Kot, is also a tried and trusted man of the stock exchange speculator. As senior media advisor, he heads the digital publishing unit at the afore-mentioned fund. However, the Media Development Investment Fund (MDIF) headed by Ms Nemcova acquired ownership not only in 444 but also in Magyar Narancs, another Hungarian paper.

With Soros’s people came the oligarch’s money

Regarding the history of Magyar Jeti, which is also behind Lakmusz, it is worth noting that from 2014 – that is, from the year that Soros’s empire set foot in the company – hefty foreign grants appeared. As early as 2014, their project titled ‘Civil Journalism’ received a grant of 49,500 US dollar as part of the Hungarian programme of the Open Society Initiative for Europe (OSIFE).

In 2019, Peter Uj and his staff also won a grant from the Switzeland-based OAK Foundation, a partner organisation of George Soros’s foundation.

AS previously reported by Origo,hu, a document from the Open Society Foundations refers to OAK as a partner organisation, with a specific focus on European projects. Another article also reveals that the organisation was founded by Alan M. Parker, a former business partner of George Soros, and has two senior staff members who are also members of the Open Society Foundations’ human rights initiative. The fact that the Hungarian Helsinki Committee also received support from them clearly shows that they belong to the same group.

Magyar Jeti also received support from Google almost every year, winning three grants for projects from Google Digital News Initiative Innovations Fund between 2017 and 2019, with the support continuing in 2021.

Last year’s report also revealed that the support released for Magyar Jeti Zrt totaled 114,357,000 Hungarian forints (more than 280 thousand euros), which consisted of three components: grants awarded by Google Digital News Initiative Innovations Fund; funding from the Network of European Foundations; and funding from European Commission’s 2020 Work Program on the Financing of Pilot Projects and Preparatory Actions in the field of „Communications Networks, Content and Technology”, as described in detail in the previous parts of our article series.

It is noteworthy that the global giant Google awarded 150 million euros in funding for 662 digital projects through its Digital News Initiative Innovation Fund. Four main objectives were identified in the last grant period: increasing digital revenues, telling local stories, fighting misinformation, and exploring new technologies. Primarily left-wing publishers appear among the Hungarian projects.

• Atlatszo [Transparent],
• a CEU publication,
• Independent Journalism Foundation,
• HVG Publishing Zrt,
• K-Monitor,
• Mertek Media Monitor, Transparency International,
• XXI. szazad Media Kft. (also publisher of Nepszava) in essence practically the entire Soros network, apart from the two right-wing media companies.

A network of networks

But it is also worth talking about the Network of European Foundations, which appeared behind Magyar Jeti last year, and is also in the financing of 444 and thus Lakmusz, which they themselves admit.

In its introduction, the organization describes itself as coordinating European NGOs in the field of philanthropy, which is how, they try to achieve a greater reach. Among their partner organisations is the Open Society Foundations.

 

Looking at the names of directors in the Brussels-based organisation, we soon come across Soros’s agents. The organisation is headed by Alexandre Giraud, who came from the French NGO world. But his vice-president is Franz Karl Pruller, who is senior consultant at the ERSTE Bank foundation and, incidentally, attended the tellingly named Open University. The extent to which he is part of the Soros circle is clearly shown by the fact that at an Open Society-organised conference in 2016, he gave a talk on the dangers of extremism and populism in Central Europe.

But Stefan Schaefers, from the Brussels-based King Baudouin Foundations, is also a member of the board. Schaefers had previously been the president of the European Balkans Fund and of the European Integration and Migration Program (EPIM), but he had also been a board member of the European Policy Center.

It is also worth mentioning Saskia van den Dool-Gietman, who came from the Adessium Foundation, which finances the European Council of Refugees and Exiles organisation in a joint project with Soros’s Open Society.

But Marcus Lux, who came from Robert Bosch Stiftung, is also here. There is such an overlap between the organisation and Soros’s Open Society that, for example, in October, Sandra Breka became the organisation’s deputy director.

Soros’s money came in handy to secure financial stability

The financial situation of Magyar Jeti is stable, with the company’s sales revenue growing dynamically. Compared to the start in 2014 – when income barely exceeded HUF 200 million (approx. 500 thousand euros), this increased to HUF 540 million (approx. EUR 1.3 million) in 2019. The company’s after-tax profits were first in the black only in 2019 by HUF 2 million (approx EUR 5 thousand ). Since then, however, in 2020 and 2021, the company’s sales and profits have skyrocketed: in addition to a sales revenue of HUF 840 million (about 2.1 million euros), and a profit after tax of 163 million (over 400 thousand euros) was recorded. Of course, the support from the American speculator to stabilise their financial situation didn’t hurt either. All this has now come to fruition.

But let’s return to Lakmusz,

whose editorial staff is almost entirely composed of Soros’s tried and true pseudo-civil crusaders, for whom journalism at the new paper is only one stage in their career within the empire.

The editor-in-chief, Blanka Zoldi, came to head Lakmusz from Direkt 36, which is also a left-wing organisation, but she is a veteran in this world, as years ago Soros’s Civil Liberties Union (TASZ) referred to Ms Zoldi as a client.

Nora Dioszegi-Horvath is a journalist who previously worked at Merce, also supported by Soros, and helped organize Budapest Pride for years. She produces podcasts, in which many of her invited guests (i.e. Peter Krekko and Andras Racz) are also members of Soros-connected circles.

Media researcher Szilvi Nemet was in the Film, media and cultural theory doctoral program at ELTE University from 2019. From 2018-2020, she worked on CEU’s Visual Studies Platform, so is also connected to the Soros network in several aspets.

Eszter Neuberger wrote articles for hvg.hu, and for Abcug, which was discontinued at the end of 2019, and for 444. She is also connected to the domestic Soros empire in another way, as she graduated from CEU with an MA in Minority Policy/Nationalism Studies (MA).

It is therefore clearly visible that the corps of self-proclaimed „independent fact-checkers” is closely linked to the imperial network of the US oligarch George Soros, both in terms of its funding and personnel.