This year, for the first time, the President of the State Audit Office of Hungary presented the newly established SAO Grand Prize. Dr Árpád Kovács, President of the Fiscal Council and former President of the SAO, Mária Makkai, former Deputy Director of the SAO, who retired this year, and Dr Gyula Pulay, Chief Economist of the SAO and Head of the Special Analyses Department, received the highest level of appreciation that can be awarded by the President of the SAO.
The SAO Grand Prize, established in 2023, can be awarded to natural persons who, through their outstanding and exemplary activities, have contributed to the development of the SAO’s statutory and social standing, its professional authority, the achievement of its objectives, the renewal of its organisation, the performance and development of its activities, the fulfilment of its fundamental role, its social esteem, the more efficient use of public funds and the further development of its audit work.
At the ceremony commemorating the 1956 Revolution and War of Independence, Dr. László Windisch, President of the SAO, awarded the SAO Grand Prize to Prof. Dr. Árpád Kovács, President of the Fiscal Council, former President of the State Audit Office of Hungary, in recognition of his outstanding research and practical work in the field of public finance and fiscal processes over many decades, as well as his contribution to the organisation of the professional and methodological work of the SAO, the development of its staff and the establishment of the organisation.
The SAO Grand Prize was awarded to Mária Makkai, who had worked at the SAO since the beginning of its reorganisation after the regime change in 1990, and during her professional career she has supervised and managed successful audits in many areas of public finances, all audits coordinated by her were distinguished by their outstanding usefulness.
The SAO Grand Prize was awarded to Mária Makkai, who had worked at the SAO since 1990, the beginning of the reorganisation after the regime change. During her professional career she supervised and managed successful audits in many areas of public finances, all of which she coordinated with outstanding efficiency.
The third recipient, Dr Gyula Pulay, Chief Economist of the SAO, Head of the Special Analyses Department, whose activities in recent years have made a significant contribution to the academic and professional work of the institution, to the methodological renewal of fiscal and macroeconomic analysis, and whose teaching and academic activities have made the values of the SAO and the principle of disciplined fiscal management known and recognised outside the walls of the institution.
