Tușnad seen as a lesson for the opposition

A conservative critic of the government calls on the opposition to build a world view and a project as solid and convincing as the one laid out by PM Orbán in his yearly address in Transylvania – even if he disagrees with the Prime Minister on most points.

In Magyar Nemzet, deputy editor Szabolcs Szerető admits that in his regular annual speech at Băile Tușnad on Saturday (see BudaPost, July 15), Prime Minister Viktor Orbán outlined a consistent explanation of world events, international and national conflicts. Szerető thinks some elements of that picture are true, others are not, but that they are likely to help mobilise the government’s supporters. He thinks the opposition is doing its job by criticising the Prime Minister’s interpretation of facts, but they should also learn a lesson from him. Namely in building a community and thinking in strategic terms. Opposition politicians are good at complaining about government propaganda and about the electoral system (which forces disparate parties to coalesce into one electoral alliance), but that doesn’t absolve them from the responsibility of the job they fail to perform – just like Mr Orbán, they would also need a consistent worldview and their own narrative to convince the electorate, if they want to become credible challengers to Mr Orbán’s, Szerető warns.

Tags: opposition, Orbán