The city council of Budapest on Wednesday overwhelmingly supported a bid to prevent a Dubai-based developer from potentially erecting the European Union‘s tallest skyscrapers in the Hungarian capital.
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban‘s government has designated a large area of land around a disused railway station to be revitalised in a controversial multi-billion-euro agreement with the United Arab Emirates.
Earlier this month, Emirati developer Eagle Hills Properties inked a deal to buy the land around the largely dilapidated Rakosrendezo railway station, without there being a public tender.
But with 23 votes in favour and just 10 against, the capital’s city council passed environmentalist Mayor Gergely Karacsony’s proposal on using the municipality’s pre-emptive rights to purchase the area.
Eagle Hills says it wants to construct a “world-class green district” costing more than “12 billion euros” as part of its “Grand Budapest” project – dubbed “mini-Dubai” by critics.
Orban’s government argues that the investment would revitalise a neglected rust belt, create jobs and contribute to economic growth.
However, critics are concerned that the developer would build luxurious real estate, including record-sized towers, driving up property prices and ruining the city’s skyline.
There are also fears that the project would mainly benefit pro-government oligarchs.
“The government, so sensitive to sovereignty, is seeking the favours of American and Arab investors, and does not care about the opinion of the people of Budapest,” Karacsony said in a Facebook post.
 ‘Trump Tower’ rumours
Legal experts, however, warn that the government could circumvent the city’s blocking bid.
“If the state exercises its right of repurchase, then the (city council’s) exercise of the pre-emptive right was just a political juggling act,” Lorant Horvath, president of a legal NGO, told the 444 news site.
Opposition leader Peter Magyar — not usually aligned with Karacsony — threatened to call protests if the municipality’s purchase bid is not respected.
“Hungarians do not want a mini-Dubai, a Trump Tower,” he said on Facebook, referencing the rumoured involvement of US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
Last week, investigative portal VSquare — which first broke the news on the development plans in 2023 — reported that Kushner may become involved in the project, citing a source close to the government.
Kushner’s Affinity Partners company partnered with Eagle Hills to build a Trump-branded luxury hotel at the site of the former Yugoslav army headquarters in Belgrade that was bombed in US-led NATO strikes in 1999.
Eagle Hills did not comment on Kushner’s possible involvement and Affinity Partners did not respond to AFP’s inquiry.
Orban is considered one of Trump’s closest allies in the European Union.
The nationalist leader is currently on a state visit to Abu Dhabi, where he was pictured meeting with Eagle Hills founder Mohamed Alabbar.
The project’s contract — published by Hungary’s state asset manager — theoretically permits Eagle Hills to construct skyscrapers up to 500 metres tall.
There is a 90-metre legal limit currently in force, but the deal stipulates the changing of building regulations to meet the project’s requirements.
This could potentially allow the tallest skyscraper within the European Union to be erected, far exceeding the tallest tower in the Hungarian capital, the 143-metre-tall headquarters of oil and gas multinational MOL.
