The ruling parties' faction leader in the capital is expecting the mayor to provide answers regarding press reports about the sale of the city hall building.

„Gergely Karacsony doesn’t even know what’s going on with City Hall?” asks Zsolt Lang – group leader of the Fidesz-Christian Democrat (KDNP) party alliance in the Budapest Assembly – in an open letter, following news reports regarding the sale of the capital’s City Hall building. Mr Lang called on the mayor to clarify some issues.

In his letter posted on the Facebook page of Fidesz’s Budapest group, the government official wrote that Mayor Karacsony had provided some reassuring answers to news appearing in Thursday’s press regarding the sale of the building complex. However, Friday saw some new developments, which raised many more questions.

The lawmaker of the Fidesz-Christian Democrat (KDNP) party alliance would like to know if Gergely Karcsony is planning to launch an internal investigation into the initiative put forward by a certain company named in Friday’s press reports regarding the sale of City Hall, and if there are any officials in the capital who – without the mayor’s prior knowledge – had actually begun negotiations to sell the entire building complex and the plot of land associated with it. Mr Lang also inquired that if the company named in the news received no encouragement from the Budapest municipality or any of its employees, would Mayor Karacsony launch legal proceedings against them?

„It’s important for all Budapest residents to clearly see what is true from the news of the past two days,” Zsolt Lang writes, expecting an immediate answer from the mayor.

The Hungarian Index news portal published an article on Thursday, saying the capital’s local government led by the leftist-liberal Gergely Karacsony – would sell its most valuable property, the City Hall. In its update published on Friday, the portal referred to an existing contract as proof of the municipality’s intention.

Mayor Karacsony, who stressed on Thursday that he no longer reads the afore-mentioned news site, reacted to the article on social media. „When selling its property, the Budapest Municipality does not employ real estate agents. These transactions are handled by the city’s fully owned asset management firm. „He wrote that he would file a complaint „to find out if anyone had given the false impression of being authorised to sell the city hall building.”

Situated on a plot of about forty thousand square meters, the construction of the traditional building began in the 18th century. The building, classified as a World Heritage site in a protected zone, is currently Budapest’s most valuable property. The three-storey baroque-style building complex occupies about forty percent of the plot, offering some fifty thousand square meters of usable area in the central part of the capital, the portal writes.