Budapest: United opposition leading race for Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orban He began his campaign Friday in next year’s national election and promised to “liberate” the country from the right-wing populist leader.
The liberal mayor of Budapest, Gergely caraxony, who is one of five contenders to lead a coalition of main opposition parties, spoke to several hundred supporters who had gathered despite the early autumn drizzle in the capital.
Caracsoni said next spring’s election would be “a celebration rather than a mockery of democracy.”
“From tomorrow, we will free Hungary from the rule of Viktor Orban,” he said.
The country’s six opposition parties have resolved to iron out ideological differences and coordinate their candidates after more than a decade of Orban’s bitter loss. fideszow The party, which has a two-thirds majority in Parliament.
Although popular in his country, orban It is often accused by critics of autocratic tendencies, and seizing control of the Hungarian media in order to control the political narrative.
Following his party’s national elections in 2018, independent election observers found that the competition was free, but not fair, and that “intimidating and xenophobic rhetoric, media bias and opaque campaign funding[had]made it difficult for genuine political debate to be held.” The space was limited.”
The opposition’s primary contest, which begins on Saturday and will take place in two rounds, is part of its electoral strategy of fielding single combined candidates against the Fidesz contender in each electoral district.
The method saw significant gains during municipal elections in 2019 when the coalition reversed leadership of Budapest and most of Hungary’s major cities.
Judit Skirba, who took part in the campaign event on Friday, said she supports Karaxony but will vote for another opposition candidate even if she loses the primary.
She said, “I came because after a long time, I finally see a face that I am happy to see, who is honest and who seems believable.”
Opposition politicians say their unity strategy is the only way to defeat Orban, when his party enacted and unilaterally passed a new election law in 2011.
That law changed the electoral system from a two-round process to a single-round majority system, and reduced the number of parliamentary seats by nearly half, something critics say unfairly favors the ruling party: 2014 In the 2014 elections, Fidze won a two-thirds parliamentary majority, receiving less than 45% of the vote.
Orbán has criticized liberal parties for making common cause with the far-right in the past. jobbic, which has tried to rebrand itself as a conservative people’s party but was known in the past for openly racist and anti-Semitic attitudes.
Yet recent elections show the United Opposition and Orban’s party in a neck-and-neck race that observers predict will be the closest in recent memory.
“Many of us are opposition voters who have long been waiting for the opposition parties, not wanting to defeat each other, but Viktor Orban,” said Karaksoni.
The liberal mayor of Budapest, Gergely caraxony, who is one of five contenders to lead a coalition of main opposition parties, spoke to several hundred supporters who had gathered despite the early autumn drizzle in the capital.
Caracsoni said next spring’s election would be “a celebration rather than a mockery of democracy.”
“From tomorrow, we will free Hungary from the rule of Viktor Orban,” he said.
The country’s six opposition parties have resolved to iron out ideological differences and coordinate their candidates after more than a decade of Orban’s bitter loss. fideszow The party, which has a two-thirds majority in Parliament.
Although popular in his country, orban It is often accused by critics of autocratic tendencies, and seizing control of the Hungarian media in order to control the political narrative.
Following his party’s national elections in 2018, independent election observers found that the competition was free, but not fair, and that “intimidating and xenophobic rhetoric, media bias and opaque campaign funding[had]made it difficult for genuine political debate to be held.” The space was limited.”
The opposition’s primary contest, which begins on Saturday and will take place in two rounds, is part of its electoral strategy of fielding single combined candidates against the Fidesz contender in each electoral district.
The method saw significant gains during municipal elections in 2019 when the coalition reversed leadership of Budapest and most of Hungary’s major cities.
Judit Skirba, who took part in the campaign event on Friday, said she supports Karaxony but will vote for another opposition candidate even if she loses the primary.
She said, “I came because after a long time, I finally see a face that I am happy to see, who is honest and who seems believable.”
Opposition politicians say their unity strategy is the only way to defeat Orban, when his party enacted and unilaterally passed a new election law in 2011.
That law changed the electoral system from a two-round process to a single-round majority system, and reduced the number of parliamentary seats by nearly half, something critics say unfairly favors the ruling party: 2014 In the 2014 elections, Fidze won a two-thirds parliamentary majority, receiving less than 45% of the vote.
Orbán has criticized liberal parties for making common cause with the far-right in the past. jobbic, which has tried to rebrand itself as a conservative people’s party but was known in the past for openly racist and anti-Semitic attitudes.
Yet recent elections show the United Opposition and Orban’s party in a neck-and-neck race that observers predict will be the closest in recent memory.
“Many of us are opposition voters who have long been waiting for the opposition parties, not wanting to defeat each other, but Viktor Orban,” said Karaksoni.
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