Can Hungary's Opposition Finally Break Orbán's Grip on Power?

[Celerity]

After 15 years of Fidesz rule, an unlikely challenger threatens Viktor Orbán's grip on Hungary but formidable obstacles remain.

https://www.socialeurope.eu/can-hungarys-opposition-finally-break-orbans-grip-on-power



Prime Minister Viktor Orbán famously boasted of turning Hungary into an “illiberal democracy.” In reality, Hungary has ceased to be a genuine democracy and is best understood as “a hybrid regime of electoral autocracy,” according to the European Parliament, or as a “post-communist mafia state” modelled on Putin’s Russia, in the view of Bálint Magyar, the sociologist and former government minister.

Yet, after 15 years of uninterrupted Fidesz rule, the party’s political ascendancy is no longer assured. With parliamentary elections scheduled for spring 2026, Fidesz has been trailing an opposition party, Tisza, for over a year, although recent polls suggest that Tisza’s lead has narrowed. Led by Péter Magyar—previously an obscure, if comparatively senior, figure within Fidesz and the ex-husband of Orbán’s former Minister of Justice, Judit Varga—Tisza has adopted much of the rhetoric and symbolism that brought Fidesz electoral success. A self-declared conservative with a commitment to Christian values, Magyar frequently appears at political rallies brandishing a large Hungarian flag. The symbolism is potent in a country with long, painful memories of foreign occupation—Ottoman, Habsburg, Nazi German, Soviet—and where nationalist sentiment runs deep.

Fidesz’s efforts to portray itself as the only genuinely patriotic political party have made little headway against Tisza and its flag-bearing leader. At the same time, Magyar has attracted enthusiastic support by promising to end Hungary’s isolation within the EU, and to halt the nepotism, corruption, and assaults on democracy that have characterised Fidesz’s decade and a half in power.

The odds are stacked against change

Despite Magyar’s success in mounting a credible challenge to Orbán and Fidesz within a remarkably short time—he only became leader of the previously obscure Tisza party in 2024—he faces an uphill struggle. Although Hungary’s economy remains stagnant, the government has promised a series of costly economic measures—increased pensions, lifetime relief from income tax for mothers with two or more children, generous government loans for prospective homeowners—that have helped to boost its flagging popularity.

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[dutch777]

1. One wonders why the EU tolerates Hungary. Probably don't want them ending up more in Putin's orbit

I suppose they can't just kick them out even if they wanted to. And they don't want them becoming a de facto Russian state like Byelorussia.