(00:00:00) I could find that the American people as individuals are similar to the Hungarian people and all they can talk to each other. They have questions and maybe they want to listen to my answers. But at the same time maybe of the historical background I find that the American people are a bit native and in a sense childish people, I mean that well, I can understand that. The United States is a huge country and the you have so many problems in these in this country. Maybe you don't have enough opportunities to look out afterward. But well I dare to say that the American people are still isolated from the on with work. Can you give me an example of that naivete a juicing? You know, if if an American asks me about Hungary, you know, these questions in my opinion could be asked 20 years ago. So they don't know anything about Hungary. They don't know anything about how much Hungary has developed since 56, you know, almost every question concentrates of on events on defection on dissidents and they don't want to know how hungry is is like today. This is what I mean that American people are naive. Maybe they are ready or they are willing to know about different countries about socialist countries. But I think that they are not prepared enough to have a objective or a more realistic picture about socialism about socialist countries, but at the same time II have to say that I enjoy my being here because it's a great experience for me as a human being. You know, this is the first time I am here in the United States, so I am very interested in being here. But these are my first impressions Bruno Lopez you have been here before some impressions of yours on this visit particularly to Minnesota. Hmm. Well now you tell me well, I was here before I went to New York, but it was different. You see I went I came here as a tourist and now I came on a learning working base and in really it's different because you prepare yourself to see different things no need you know to come and enjoy but to come and learn of whatever you see and I think the greatest lesson I've learned in this trip is that there are different realities. There's not one America. There are hundreds of levels of America hundreds of different types of realities. Some will be beautiful. Some will be in just About the state will it's it you narrow my my answer because I think it's a beautiful state. And it's a beautiful state not only geographically be but it can you know, economically it doesn't have as many problems as a state's you don't you don't really view problems. You don't you don't get to see complex situations like in other states you get to see hmm. It strikes you that things are more organized here or a little bit more in control perhaps I think someone controlling and I see that economically small is more a little bit more uniform you find things Muhammad you've have been to the United States before to what are your impressions of being here this time versus the ones you had from other visits and also compared to some of the the ideas you had about this country before you visited the first time ideas. You might have gotten either from the press or from films. Well, I should say that the American movie industry is responsible for how the Americans are portrayed outside in my country speaking about the ordinary man was not been outside. These Americans in the movies Cowboys killing destroying the TV the same. This is the Kodiak. Yeah, gorgeous Six Million Dollar Man all of them and they read about the CIA the FBI. This is how the American is portrayed. But for me as a journalist working as the international disc, I think I have a little bit more knowledge before I was here but still in back memory, there's some of what I was seeing, you know, so when I came the first time I was a little bit You might say it's Kurt and I found that was not the real word in America Americans are different. I mean the ordinary people, you know, I met are just like any people in the world Simple Kind. Thus this is the way I got to know them here. Why'd you mahendru your impressions of this country? (00:06:04) Well, I'd like to say first that I've been in America only for six weeks maybe seven weeks now and that my impressions are limited to Minnesota and South Dakota. And I have found great disparity between these two states that in Minnesota. Everything is wonderful. It's the it's the Bread Basket of the United States and then we went to South Dakota where we visited some Indian Reservations and there was a very very great difference between the two styles of living. It was a lot of bitterness on the part of the Indians towards the rest of the wire Anglo-Saxon Protestants what you might call the Wasps. There was also a feeling of great helplessness on the part of the officials who we interviewed who were dealing with some of the problems. So so one realize that there's much more to this country than the surface happiness and I get the feeling that Americans in a sense do not like to face harsh realities there has been so much talk about petrol consumption cutting down of fuel cars and people are getting excited. And and upset and saying that the oil companies are Dunning Us in this is happening that's happening. But but they really don't want to look the issues in the face. I think they have a tendency of glossing over things of Innocence shying away from from realities and perhaps this has been the conditioning of the last two decades maybe since the 50s when the country has really reached scale the limits of prosperity that they probably didn't have known before so I guess they don't want to lose the American dream which seemed so close to (00:07:52) them talking about things like gasoline and oil shortages or perceived shortages brings up to me at least the whole topic of inflation. And as you know, that's probably the most talked about topic these days in the press in this country are certainly one of the most talked about topics seems to be a great deal of concern about the value of the American dollar both here and abroad the rising. Cost of just about everything in this country and yet somewhere in the background occasionally we hear that we still in America have it very very very good compared to what it is. In other countries in terms of things like the prices we pay for gasoline for instance and the prices we pay for homes for housing. And I that raises the whole question in my mind of what if indeed the inflation Trend that's going on in this country is worldwide and if it is what it's like in your countries Peter, what about hungry? You know that hunger is an eccentric plans economical system. And well, I would like to talk about two processes. First of all, we import or mostly from the Soviet Union, but on the other hand, it's quite natural that we have been influenced by the oil prices given by the OPEC countries because we import oil from the Middle East to but because of the central planning our inflation rate is about between two and three percent in a year in Hungary. And well, I don't think so that we can talk about the Oriole inflation in Hungary in comparison in comparison the inflation rate in Western countries or in the United States, but it doesn't mean that we don't have to face with the energy crisis because we are influence to if we have to fight against it. I don't know how but you know that hunger is a very open country, you know because as we have no oil no gas no call you have to import every room materials a minor is for from abroad how give me some examples of how your government is controlling inflation in your country to that very low percentage of two to three percent a year. Perhaps in terms of things like the price of gasoline or the cost of housing. Yeah are first of all. There are maybe we need different and many sectors of products the prices of which are given by the state. So the prices of these products are fixed, you know, and not the corporation decide the prices of these products, but the state itself. No, it's all are for example, the seven sister decide to do increase the price of oil in the United States. They can do it. But in in Hungary no corporation that can increase the price of oil on the only the state. So this is the rain how didst State can control the prices and inflation? How much is a gallon of gasoline selling for in Budapest today? Yeah II have to make a quick count. One liter is 10 friends and then forums is half dollar. So I got on a dollar seventy. Yeah, uh-huh. So it's still higher than this and this country but it sure but it sounds like it's lower than it is. In other European countries. Some European countries are paying for well over two dollars a gallon. What about housing and Hungary can a young couple in their mid to late 20s who have gotten married in the last few years, maybe have a child can they expect reasonably to either owned a home of their own or to have a townhouse or condominium or what are the prospects for them today having something like that of their own there are three sectors in housing the state sector on the Co-operative sector and the private sector the last mean that if somebody has enough money to build his or her own. House about a he or a she can do it, but it needs much money. And usually the people don't have enough money to build their own houses or friends so they can join a Cooperative which is specialized in building houses or flats or they can rent a flat from the state if we built more than 40 thousand plants hoses in a year in Hungary, but but at the same time, I think the housing problem in Hungary is is still very hard very hard because you know, that hunger is is in a sense an old country and the buildings are all to so if we have to reconcile reconstruct these old buildings and at the same time even have to build new houses. But you know, it's a great pressure for the building industry and well so far. I think that we couldn't manage to solve our problems and I don't know how much time it will take to solve these housing problems. But you know, if young couple has two or three children if they can get the flat for only 60 thousand forints and sixty thousand forints means a $3,000 and they can get the snacks, you know, I mean forever. And then you have to pay only a very small rent for this land or for this sounds Peter. What was the relation between having a child not having a chance to get an apartment. I didn't really get that since you have children you have trouble getting an apartment. And if you had children would be easier. Yeah sure, but why I don't see the because well if if I am with only my wife I can work very hard. I can collect money. But if I have two or three children, it's far more difficult to collect money because I have or even have responsibilities for the children also the state he'll do it to do young people. Well, I can work and can endure everything Bruno Lopez your country is rapidly taking on a much higher profile in the international world at least as far as Americans are concerned than it did either that even a few years ago. Even after more than a year ago Americans are paying much more attention to Mexico and I'm interested we were talking about inflation and we're talking about petroleum. What all of that is doing to Mexico and what are some of the hopes I love the people in your country for the future particularly with regard to to what appears to be a new status in the world. Do you sense that does that a sense, you know country that have the Mexico is beginning to to become a Power. Well, I want to make a comment of the thing. You said before that people here are starting to be more aware of Mexico. And it's I think it's really really it's a like a tragic joke because before the information on the reserves on oil and before the the before, you know, we had we started publicizing the oil we had we used to be treated like like a child country and now you know with oil well, everything is starting to be more friendly and everything started to be much nicer with us and people starting to be more aware the the media starting to change. View about the problems of immigration. They're planning to let more Mexicans come in. The whole policy is changing but we we have oil the structure of Power with you know be the same for centuries and we would be like The Condemned of the Empire kind of thing. But anyway, it is changing our economy. Largely. It's two very very premature to say what's going to happen. I have my opinion. My opinion is that the exploitation of oil in the exporting oil is going to create bigger and more inflation in Mexico. There's going to be a sector that will have will be more affluent. The sector is going to be the the state-owned. Oil Company, you gotta stay down but we call it. Well, it's owned by the country. They mix the people who work there will probably be get to be more affluent and then you'll have all the Contracting sector, you know, the people who get contracts from pemex to be in the drilling drilling building machinery and those people are going to start having much more money to an in there and that money in the market will will I think will be one of the reasons to to have more inflation. I don't think many people will see the money of oil what many people will see is maybe an Impulse in the construction of infrastructure infrastructure, like maybe more hospitals many things that that were delayed in the during the crisis of 1974 76 This is where the late because as you know, we had a depreciation in our currency and we had to ask for loans to the exim bank and to the development Bank. And those Banks lend and in the monetary fund the international monetary fund and those Banks lend us the money, but under the condition that we stopped all non productive Investments. They consider non-productive hospitals schools roads, whatever it does it's not going to produce wealth is very productive for them. Whether it's going to be human humanitarian. Well, that's very productive. So maybe that's virtually a halter program to the construction of things like hospitals schools and things like there was a very big slow down a very big slow don't know the complete halt but there was a big slow down so you expect that one of the uses of this new money will be to start building those kinds of things again. Yeah, but you still don't think that that money is going to get spread around the whole country. It sounds like that it will it will stay primarily with the in certain sectors oil oil people technicians and the like Well, I think not all but a great part, but I'm very negative about it. I'm very negative because it's something really sad. We are country used to that many ways is used to many deceptions many we are we've always been in many ways a very wealthy country potentially speaking. But then we're to our country with that corruption tradition. At not only at government level you see it at corporate level you see it in the private sector you see everywhere and in the past few years has been a clean up and we'll see in the 80s will see the results of this just heat up you just how well it's worked. We are a country which has suffered a cultural colonialism that it's hard to imagine a less you go like to Mexico City. It's a cultural Colonial Colonial is that it's been imposed by American corporations. We are losing our identity as a country and this is very evident. Like when you go when you see the low-income people they are, you know, they go to discos and they they were American clothes and those are the most visible things. But then you start seeing as when you when you talk to people about class aspirations. What do they want from life? It's not very similar to what people would like. You know, they have they're starting to have a very special idea but security people are starting to overwork for security this this was a very special idea for United States, you know, we used to be like, you know, well, let's let's let the children on the children have to fight for the for what they want in many ways and our responsibilities just to give them the education we can give them and then if they want to achieve more well, it's their responsibility as human beings, but that's changing its yeah, the attitudes are changing. We have Halloween we did when they used to have following we used to have our day of the dead which is a very beautiful occasion which people used to go to cemeteries and take presents to the cemeteries and and spend a day with a with that now and now we are you know, selling plastic pumpkins and plastic suits for the kids to go around in it and bug people we have that and thanks to Sears to Woolworths to the big companies with now we have Beautiful Halloween day when you have Santa Claus we had our our I don't know how you call them. The Three Kings or Magi and that was very nice. Not now. Now we had to have Santa Claus. Of course. We have a Christmas tree. You have something NASA that everybody built we call it, you know the place where Christ was born. We used to get little human figures and building with clay in we were used to do the whole thing. No now we have to buy a Christmas tree and this is natural trees are very expensive. We end up with an aluminum tree around there or plastic tree hanging around we didn't have those fix and now we well, it's sad. I think it's a it's a Thai culture that many senses losing his identity. And when I country loses identity lose the sense of belonging looses Pride use that lose a lot of things despite the fact that it may be getting more money for itself despite. Let's move along Muhammad. Mustapha. I'd like to ask you a little bit about it. Nation in your country and and the economic conditions in the Sudan. As developing agricultural country the Sedan like most other countries is a victim. Of the oil producing countries and then the theory and the cereal countries. So, you know, we have to pay for the petroleum. We have to be for the technology. We are always paying and we are always looking for loans. So the rate of inflation is going high and high on the time the Sudan is in a very interesting part of the world. It seems to me being very close to the Horn of Africa who are a lot of things have been going on in the last few years what has all of that activity had to do had what kind of an effect has that had on the Sudan We are suffering from the influx of refugees. as a result of the war in retrieval sepia Yogananda Central African Republic Chad Congo we have Thousands thousands of refugees in the country, which doesn't help the economy. I don't suppose. Yeah, it has its impact on the economy and social impact. What kind of impact does it have talk about those a little bit about the effect the social effects of having people come in from several different countries. Yeah. We are Muslims. You know, we have we adopted Islam as a religion and their ways of life this refugees differ from our ways of life. And what they their behavior is different from or daily D Behavior. So is there a lot of tension there is no tension now. But we are silently suffering. Why is it that the government of Sudan has allowed all of these people to come from the various countries seek Refuge there? Yeah, your car regarded political, you know, the rotarians are fighting the syrians and we are backing the eretrians and in Uganda suddenly happened, you know and the refugees some of them are from and they wrote now Sudan is but they were from Sudanese origin and they just crossed the border to the Sudan and the same in chat. They are revolutionary groups and we are backing them and the people come across the border sister. So we have politically we have to accept them. Not economical, why'd you mahendru a little bit about inflation in your country? We've things have been very, it seems very upset politically in your country the last few years. And what has that what has that had what kind of an effect has that had on the economy of the country. (00:26:19) I think this last year. In fact since May we've been having problems because there have been two successive governments, which have fallen and we are now on the verge of a new election in January. What we do have now at least the latest report is that there is about between 14 to 18 percent inflation in the country today and around January or earlier. Maybe say late December it was it was very different picture because immediately after mrs. Gandhi's government fell and the Junta Paris came into Power there was a dramatic change of policy and that was going back to the Villages, you know, instead of concentrating on industrialization so much. They wanted to carry out lots of agrarian reforms and pay the farmer better given more incentive to produce so they did have some very good harvests. They had a lot of grain stored away in case there was a drought and that drop the inflation we had price stability and suddenly this there's this political turmoil and that has now been Bind with a bad drought again this year. So I think things have just all the factors the negative factors have come together all at once and I have a feeling that we are going to go into an era of probably great economic depression great political instability may be for the next four or five years and we might end up with very bad factionalism. Very bad National Politics. The arena has at the moment divided because mrs. Gandhi's planning to Stage a comeback. She's trying to get support from the southern states and you see there's this Great Divide which is in India, you have the northern states which are the hindi-speaking states which have dominated the politics of the country because almost all are our prime ministers have come from the northern states and they have been trying to impose Hindi as a language on the Southern States who have rejected it because they don't want this kind of domination and the Southern States now think that mrs. Gandhi is probably a better bet than all the northern politicians who ganged up together. So you have three major factions competing 444 par in the country and it doesn't look as if either one of them is going to get an absolute majority to form a really stable government. And so we likely to have many ups and downs. Mrs. Gandhi might come in. They'll be a lot of bargaining and horse-trading going on and you have many economic sources always economic factors corporations Industries, which are ranged behind the politicians. And therefore if you have charge and saying who's now the caretaker prime minister, he's a kiss on leader. He's a farm farm leader, but he belongs to a very rich landlord group. He does not represent the interests of the smaller peasant of the landless surf or or the sharecroppers, then you have mrs. Gandhi who is quite often backed by larger industrial groups. Who also have a great deal of interest in Farming so you have these corporate identities, you know coming in behind the politicians and I think every time on looks at the politics of the country one invariably runs into the economics of the country. (00:30:01) We had a climatologist speak on our are a few weeks ago who's talking about changes in the world climate and one of the areas he said was probably going to see drier times is India. Yes, that's right with all of this political instability. Is there any success at all in the area of planning for such a time or is it is it something that's probably going to hit India with with little or no real preparation (00:30:33) know I have a feeling that it is going to have an effect because you see we have this vast bureaucracy and the executive, you know, even though the decisions are made by the ministers in the cabinet all those Ends are executed by the bureaucracy, which is the Indian administrative service and most of the people who control the Indian administrative service belong are very well educated Indians have got very very good educational backgrounds and they are sensitive people. I think that's the only reason why India has made such rapid strides in the last 30 years. We have had a very unwieldy democracy. We have 22 States. We have 14 official languages. We have as many different cultures and yet from a no industrial base. We become the 10th industrial power in the world in 30 in 30 years and although translated into per capita income percentages. It reflects a very low per capita income for the average Indian it there still is this this peculiar Paradox. So in spite of having a very corrupt political system in spite of having terrible politicians, I think the system has stayed and She has grown because of this great civil service that we have and even if the politicians cream of ten percent of all the money that is allotted to say drought relief program or flood control or education some of it inevitably filters down. I admit that, you know, some people say India should have a benevolent dictator or something like that, but it within the Democratic structure that we have chosen and struggled to maintain. I think we have done reasonably. Well not very well. (00:32:21) We have less than five minutes left and I still want to talk a little bit about the topic of free flow of information in your countries and maybe I can begin with you by Jew and talk a little bit about the controversy that was aired at least a few years ago at a couple of conferences some countries in the world feeling that they were not represented accurately or properly and that there was still a lot of colonialism involved in the way that news. Some countries is presented whether it be by the BBC or Reuters News service or the AP what about your feelings as a journalist from India in terms of how the events in your country are portrayed to the rest of the world. (00:33:02) I would tend to agree with the graphs is that most governments have because I think there are two things which happen in a country any country. You know, you have Three Mile Island very very disaster big disaster crisis news, which is splashed all over but at the same time you also have development going on within the country and I think we have a bigger cross to bear because everyone has this preconceived notion of say most most third world in developing countries take take India because I'm most familiar with it that it's country ridden with Superstition myths, you know lack of Education poverty sickness, hunger all that kind of thing the moment you have a cyclone. It's all over but this development which is a very very intangible kind of process is never recorded because it takes a lot of pain people are not interested everywhere here at least in the Western countries in America. I feel that news is treated as a commodity which has to be so your public wants vicarious titillation, they'd like to You're about you know floods. Oh how many thousand people died? And so (00:34:13) dramatic does the Indian press report to the Indian media report. Some of these development kinds of things you're talking (00:34:20) in greater and greater degrees. I think they did not use (00:34:23) to Muhammad. How about Sudan? Yeah. It is the same as any country in the third world. We are overflown by news from the Western World and no news from Our countries in the western world. Yeah, you know I came to the States now about two months. I didn't read anything in Africa, except the toppling of vacasa and about Rhodesia and no news about the development in Africa the other I mean the other news not the exciting news of disasters toppling and yeah corruption when you are home when you are home, where do you get your news about Africa? I get it from the wires and my sedan news agency. It gives us a better idea about African than the other news is what wire services do you will use all the way our services all of them Western and Eastern Bruno Lopez. What about Mexico and and your own thoughts about the way news about Mexico is portrayed to the rest of the world. Well, I don't know about the rest of the world. Well, I I see I'm cable letter and then use paper. So I get to see the material that you Pi sends or from Latin America. Not from Mexico and I see if you up. Well, there's one problem. It's more or less than information is subjective but its objective under the American Standard, you know under the under the standpoint of the person who goes of their 212 a country. And I couldn't as an American to go to Mexico input tray. You know Mexico like a Mexican would be which I think will be more realistic. So when I when somebody goes and writes as correspondent in since news from Mexico to the United States, he sends a particular type of news that he thinks. Would be of interest to the American public but what happens is that the American public has a taste of you know, the pop culture taste that has been fed by but the newspapers by the TV so they're used to some type of information. So what happens is that you get information the information you want to see many times you went you won't get information as involvement or All things but if this thing is changing you find in to businessweek or another magazine Sometimes some articles that are very good painter rats. Finally. I would like to talk about two issues a very shortly. I promise our first of all I work on the foreign with dance called the hunger newsagents and I am specialized in developed and developing countries and we get any news items from 26 and news agencies from all over the world and I can dare that. Well, I have the same opinion about the eight your UPI. All right there any news agencies are reports about the developing developing countries as my colleagues have You know, I am sure I am convinced that the AP or you'll be all right, the news agency can cannot say any good about Ethiopia. No matter whether several steps of the military government has served has met the demands of the people. Everything is wrong what is happening in Ethiopia? Because this country is banked by the Soviet Union and by Cuban by the other socialist countries the other issue. So what you saying? You feel that the writers reporters there are very biased and yeah, when it comes to talking about this is my opinion. This is my opinion, but and I think it's not a matter of Communism or there is a total neglection. For for the developing world. Yeah, you know I took only one sample but I have the same opinion as you have so we can agree and you know, it's true that Hungary has a good reputation in Western press but you know, if the Western press arise about Hungary about that the Hungarian people are getting more rare than wealthy. They are things that ho hunger is going back to capitalism. They forget that socialism doesn't mean misery. You know, so you're saying they're still looking for their basic beliefs in the signs and expert in a sense anteater innocence.