Press release of the State Audit Office of Hungary’s President on the nomination of the Chair and Deputy Chairs of the Integrity Authority.
The selection procedure for the Chair and Deputy Chairs of the Integrity Authority has been concluded. The Eligibility Committee Responsible for the Selection of Board Members of the Integrity Authority acknowledged the satisfaction of statutory requirements in the case of 5 applicants for the position of Chair and 13 applicants for the positions of Deputy Chairs.
As the President of the State Audit Office of Hungary, I had a personal interview with all eligible candidates, except for one candidate for Chair who withdrew in the meanwhile, and I evaluated them in the evaluation framework, which has been made public in advance, prior to the conduction of the interviews.
I nominated Mr. Ferenc Biró, who achieved the highest score, as the Chair of the Integrity Authority, also drawn to my attention at first place by the Eligibility Committee.
I proposed to appoint Ms. Tímea Holbusz and Dr. Kálmán Dabóczi as Deputy Chairs, leaning on the evaluation scores and the broad professional competence of the Board.
All three candidates have outstanding professional expertise, experience and managerial practice. Concerns were not raised in terms of their independence and impartiality.
In the evaluation framework, Ferenc Biró received 129 points, Tímea Holbusz 112 points, dr. Kálmán Dabóczi 102 points.
Among applicants who were not given mandate, only the scores of those who specifically gave written consent to this may be published – subject to EU and Hungarian data protection rules. They are as follows: Dr. István Ambrus: 94, Dr. Gábor Kovátsits: 108, Dr. Tamás Matusik: 95 (he also applied for the position of Chair and Deputy Chair).
The scores of the candidates who were not given mandate and did not give written consent to publication were as follows:
Presidential candidates: 116, 95, 60
Deputy Chairs: 112, 111 (withdrew in the meanwhile), 100, 100, 85, 84, 78, 76
Today, I informed Katalin Novák, President of Hungary, of my decision in a letter, who in accordance with the law, will appoint the new leaders of the Integrity Authority tomorrow, 4 November 2022.
I wish them a lot of strength, perseverance and success for their work!
dr. László Windisch
President
State Audit Office of Hungary
Budapest, 3 November 2022