Orban secures third term as Hungary PM
Hungarian PM’S election victory seen as a blow for Brussels after the highest voter turnout for 20 years
Vicktor Orbán, the prime minister of Hungary, won a third consecutive term in office last night after his ruling Fidesz party scored a comfortable victory in parliamentary elections.
With 85 per cent of the results in, Mr Orbán was close to winning a twothirds “super majority”.
VIKTOR ORBÁN, the controversial prime minister of Hungary, won a third consecutive term in office last night after his ruling Fidesz party scored a comfortable victory in the country’s parliamentary elections.
With 85 per cent of the results counted, Mr Orbán was even within touching distance of winning a twothirds “super majority” that would enable him to force through changes to Hungary’s constitution that would deepen what he has called his “illiberal democracy”.
The win will be seen as a blow to Brussels and a further vindication of the brand of populist identity politics which he has made his trademark since coming to office in 2010.
“This has been a decisive win,” Mr Orbán said, briefly addressing jubilant supporters outside the Fidesz party headquarters in Budapest. “In the future we are going to be able to defend our mother country.”
After thanking his fellow-conservative allies in Poland, Mr Orbán ended the night leading the crowd in song in a rendition of the anthem of the popular anti-imperial revolution of 1848. “Long live Hungary thank you for everything,” Mr Orbán said.
Ferenc Gyurcsány, a former Hungarian prime minister and leader of the Democratic Coalition said: “The Open, European Hungary has suffered a loss.”
According to preliminary results with 93 percent of votes counted, National Election Office data projected Fidesz to win 133 seats, a tight twothirds majority in the 199-seat parliament. The nationalist Jobbik party was projected to win 26 seats, while the Socialists were set to come third.
The vote saw the highest turnout in a Hungarian parliamentary election for 20 years, with polling stations forced to stay open for an extra two-and-a-half hours in some districts of Budapest to accommodate voters.
It was the culmination of a bitterly fought campaign that saw Mr Orbán demonising immigrants, Brussels and foreign-funded NGOS.
Mr Orbán had threatened “revenge” against political opponents. It highlighted the gap between him and Brussels over migration issues and raised questions about his increasingly autocratic approach to government that has seen Fidesz monopolise the media and other apparatus of state.
As the vote got under way yesterday the Fidesz party was facing calls for an inquiry into alleged electoral irregularities after The Telegraph revealed how the country’s diplomatic corps was being pressed into finding “negative” immigration stories to boost the Orbán re-election campaign.
The Swedish ambassador to Hungary, leading opposition figures from both the left and right as well as senior figures in Brussels all accused Fidesz of misusing state power for propaganda purposes. As independent television channels alleged other irregularities, including vote buying and transport of voters in the southwestern city of Pécs, opposition supporters began to gather in Budapest where extra police were being deployed as night fell.
However, Zoltan Kovacs, a government spokesman, said the high voter turnout was proof that Hungarian democracy was “alive and kicking”.
In one Budapest district, the voting line was nearly a mile long. Opposition parties had hoped a turnout approaching 70 per cent could see a repeat of the defeat handed to Mr Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party in 2002. In the event, the turnout appeared to have been driven from Fidesz-supporting rural areas.