We need your help now
Support from readers like you keeps The Journal open.
You are visiting us because we have something you value. Independent, unbiased news that tells the truth. Advertising revenue goes some way to support our mission, but this year it has not been enough.
If you've seen value in our reporting, please contribute what you can, so we can continue to produce accurate and meaningful journalism. For everyone who needs it.
Sign in. It’s quick, free and it’s up to you.
An account is an optional way to support the work we do. Find out more.
By continuing, you are indicating that you accept our Terms of Service and Privacy Policy.
HUNGARIAN PRIME MINISTER Viktor Orban has declared victory in national elections, claiming a mandate for a fourth term in power.
In a 10-minute speech to Fidesz party officials and supporters at an election night event in Budapest, Orban said it was a “huge victory” for his right-wing party.
“We won a victory so big that you can see it from the moon, and you can certainly see it from Brussels,” Orban said.
While votes were still being tallied, it appeared clear that the question was not whether Orban’s Fidesz party would win the election but by how much.
“The whole world has seen tonight in Budapest that Christian democratic politics, conservative civic politics and patriotic politics have won. We are telling Europe that this is not the past, this is the future,” Orban said.
With a quarter of votes to be counted, Orban’s Fidesz-led coalition had won 54.5%, while a pro-European opposition coalition, United for Hungary, had nearly 34%, according to the National Election Office.
It appeared possible that Fidesz would win another constitutional majority, allowing it to keep making deep changes to the central European nation.
As Fidesz party officials gathered at an election night event on the Danube river in Budapest, state secretary Zoltan Kovacs pointed to the participation of so many parties in the election as a testament to the strength of Hungary’s democracy.
“We have heard a lot of nonsense recently about whether there is democracy in Hungary,” Kovacs said. “Hungarian democracy in the last 12 years has not weakened, but been strengthened.”
The contest was expected to be the closest since Orban took power in 2010, thanks to Hungary’s six main opposition parties putting aside their ideological differences to form a united front against Fidesz. Voters were electing lawmakers to the country’s 199-seat parliament.
In a surprise performance, radical right-wing party Our Homeland Movement appeared to have garnered more than 6% of the vote, exceeding the 5% threshold needed to gain seats in parliament.
Opposition parties and international observers have noted structural impediments to defeating Orban, highlighting pervasive pro-government bias in the public media, the domination of commercial news outlets by Orban allies and a heavily gerrymandered electoral map.
Edit Zgut, a political scientist at the Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw, predicted that what appeared to be a clear victory for Orban would allow him to move further in an autocratic direction, sidelining dissidents and capturing new areas of the economy.
“Hungary seems to have reached a point of no return,” she said. “The key lesson is that the playing field is tilted so much that it became almost impossible to replace Fidesz in elections.”
The opposition coalition, United For Hungary, asked voters to support a new political culture based on pluralistic governance and mended alliances with the country’s EU and Nato allies.
While Orban had earlier campaigned on divisive social and cultural issues, he dramatically shifted the tone of his campaign after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February, and has portrayed the election since then as a choice between peace and stability or war and chaos.
While the opposition called for Hungary to support its embattled neighbour and act in lockstep with its EU and Nato partners, Orban, a long-time ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has insisted that Hungary remain neutral and maintain its close economic ties with Moscow, including continuing to import Russian gas and oil on favourable terms.
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
As another dictator emerges
Good to see! Someone to stand up to EU authoritarianism.
@bread of heaven: What EU ‘authoritarianism’ has been bothering you precisely?
@Mick Tobin: Treaties voted on twice to get the “right” answer. Making it as difficult as possible for the UK to leave the bloc to discourage any other country from going down the same path. The secretive and underhand way they force through some legislation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9RMWvYqkxk
@bread of heaven: No…..The Treaty was voted on. It was rejected. The Treaty was modified. Then it was voted on again. And the modified Treaty was accepted.
@bread of heaven: there is no easy way to leave a bloc you’ve been married to since the 70s. The fact is that the UK left the EU without any clear idea of what it wanted from the bloc subsequently. Some wanted a total break, some wanted to be Norway, and some wanted to be Canada!!!
Of course he won. When you stifle all the balances of democracy, media, courts, NGO’s, opposition, you generally win unless you are totally incompetent. The EU should expel Hungary.
@Paul Whitehead: Should the Hungarians be made vote again until they get the result you desire?
@LaoisWeather: can you at least acknowledge that the treaty we voted on twice had significant changes made to it before the second vote?!
@Paul Whitehead: fully agree time for Hungary to leave they are clearly going off in a different direction and it’s at odds with the EU direction
@LaoisWeather: No just leave EU
@LaoisWeather: No. a pointless exercise as Orban, a baby Putin, controls elections. Hungary is no longer aligned with EU values of tolerance and decency and should be expelled. Or at least we should make sure our taxes do not end up in Orbans hands. Why do you think Orban loves Putin and detests Zelenskyy? The former stays in power by corruption and the latter is a democrat.
@Paul Clancy: yes it did but had the original vote passed in a close race could we have demanded a 2nd vote?
@Paul Whitehead: that’s effectively what the liberal establishment did during the pandemic regarding points of view that differed from the main narrative, culmonating in rhe disgraceful abuse of power by Justin Trudeau. Let’s face it: Orban is not without his problems, but the main reasons liberals hate him is becsuse of his unapologetic pro-Christian, pro-family values and pro-sensible immigration policy.
@Paul Whitehead: I wonder were you this outraged when Trump was removed from all social media before the last election?
@Squarepeg01: He’s pro Putin. He also wouldn’t let any supplies through Hungary to help Ukraine. Orban practices “soft fascism”: a political system that aims to stamp out dissent and seize control of every major aspect of a country’s political and social life, without needing to resort to “hard” measures like banning elections and building up a police state. It has nothing to do with pro-Christian or family values.
Surprised nope.
Called Zelensky his enemy in his victory speech.
@DJ François: EU has got too big for its boots, if somebody said that what initially was a trade agreement would lead to having an anthem, a flag, now militarization they would have been called a conspiracy theorist. The EU is continuing what Germany always wanted to do in history through different means, it is going too far.
@John Moloney: comparing the EU to nazi Germany is beyond disgusting.
not very intelligent comment
@John Moloney: Putin’s spin is strong in you. Only for the EU a lot of the smaller European countries would have become satellite states of Russia through its open handed economic & military bullying. Just imagine if there was no EU, Putin would of run riot.
@John Moloney: He’s a fan of the butcher Putin.
@John Moloney: Says the guy who celebrates Russian atrocities.
@John Moloney: The difference in means is the important thing. The EU exists by *agreement* not by force. Countries apply to join the EU and have to meet standards, they don’t wake up to find EU.soldiers and tanks in their streets killing people until they say “OK we’ll join”.
So as long as the EU stands for peace and growth by application then I say it is a very.good thing. The EU’s principles make it a great place to live in too.
War is evil and stupid and pointless. It never achieves anything but misery and desire for revenge.
The age of empires is over. Those who think otherwise need to be discouraged by failing and by widespread condemnation for.their attempts.
The Russian leadership are not the only warmomgers in the world. I wish there were none.
Once Marie Le Pen wins EU will be gone I am afraid sooner than we expected. Sad very sad
@artur fil: WWIII will be months behind it allowing hate fuelled politicians into power is a recipe for war. We’ve learned nothing from the 20th century sadly.
@artur fil: That is a disturbing possibility, somehow this resurgence of nationalism and hatred needs to fade away for our children to know the peace we’ve enjoyed.
@Steve O’Hara-Smith: nationalism here no different. The same forces trying to drive us backwards into old style nationalism rather than acknowledging the emergence of very different societies comprising people from everywhere and the new type of world this is creating.
@Steve O’Hara-Smith: are you concerned about Ukraine’s nationalism?
If Hungary are receiving money in excess of the amount they pay in to the EU it should be stopped straight away
It is rather sad the way that people have swallowed the Orban is Evil trope. The guy is simply an old fashioned Christian Democrat politician. Back in the seventies to the nineties there wouldn’t have been a raised eyebrow at him.
@Des Hanrahan: so? I mean this isn’t the 70s or 80s or 90s. The world has moved on, and politicians are supposed to move with it. Do you yearn for the 80s with its particular flavour of rampant societal homophobia and misogyny? Anyway how’s the weather in Moscow these days?
If we value the right to self determination then we should value elections. There is no report from observers to say that the votes cast did not reflect the will of the Hungarian people. Why does anti EU sentiment exist in the first place? However it is helpful to see the alternative parties banding together to provide a coherent opposition.
@feargal de cantuin: no reports of undemocratic behaviour? Did you read the article? How’s the weather in Moscow these days?
Arthur ..hows life in the russian troll farm your working in
@Robert Frazier: I was saying this possiblity how do you made assumptions I agree with it.
What did you do for Ukrainian refugees?
My sister is volunteering every weekend back home helping at the border.
My uncle took two families from Ukraine
And you calling me russian troll??
You are idi…t
People do love easy answers
Disappointing but expected. He is a wannabe Putin remember. Let’s hope they don’t make the same mistake with him as with Putin.
@Colm O’Leary: I’m no fan of the man but to call him a Putin wannabe is laughable he has a great relationship with the US. His country uses US military equipment and there is currently of thousands of US troops in Hungary right now along with several US air Wings in response to Russias invasion of Ukraine . His government along with Poland were the first 2 NATO member to request NATO forces go on high alert and mobilelzation when the invasion started. He maybe friendly with Putin but he was quick enough to ready his countries defences and request foreign military aid incase he had to fight Russia. His country government has done the exact same as ours in helping Ukraine. But ignore all that wont you.
Well that’s extremely disappointing.
@Roy Dowling: Well, well, well.
@David F. Dwyer: Mister double standards himself has arrived. I’ll be ignoring anything you have to say about Hungary as you ignored my questions yesterday about Florida’s new anti LGBT+ laws that’s similar to Hungary’s. So have a good day.
@Roy Dowling: I didn’t answer your questions because David F. does not play into someone else’s game. But if you are so desperate to know my opinion on world affairs, and who could blame you, it didn’t surprise me at all because Florida is controlled by a typical GOP asswipe who ignored the public health crisis and kept business as usual in the sunshine state, invoking homophobic public policy was completely in line him. With that stated, Florida, and indeed the USA is not in the European Union and is a different discussion to a rogue state like Hungary lapping up EU subsidies. Awful, country, awful leader, awful people. Say hi to your old lady for me.
Shameful
And you can lump Serbia in there with Hungary- too close to Putin
If he hates Zelenski and Ukraine so much and loves Putrid and all that Russian christian authoritarianism so much, why won’t he do a deal with his hero to join the Russian Federation and let Ukraine join the EU in the place Hungary occupies. Then we would all be happy, right? Sounds fair and could end hostilities perhaps. Surely the Hungarians would be better at making tanks than the Russians, which should please Putrid.
have your say