Fidesz expected to win EP elections

A liberal weekly accuses the government of already rigging the elections for the European Parliament scheduled for May this year, while a left-liberal news outlet thinks the opposition is likely to lose because it cannot unite its forces.

In its weekly editorial column, Magyar Narancs claims that thanks to its control over both public media and an increasing proportion of commercial media outlets, as well as through the fines imposed by the State Auditing Authority on opposition parties, the government is ‘rigging the EP elections as well under our very eyes’. The editors think it may depend on only a few mandates whether the anti-establishment parties will have a blocking minority within the European Parliament. A borderline situation where his votes might tilt the balance to one side or the other they suggest, would be ‘Mr Orbán’s dream’. They accuse the European Peoples’ Party of cowardice and egoism for tolerating Fidesz among their ranks and ask whether we would all not be better off if Hungary were to be disqualified and kept out of the EP elections.

In 168óra, András Pungor quotes experts and polls which agree that Fidesz is likely to get the majority of the 21 seats allotted to Hungary in the European Parliament. The combined opposition could mathematically hope to win 11 seats of they run united, but that is strictly speaking impossible, he writes. And even if it was possible, he quotes a Median poll according to which large swathes of the electorate would be discouraged by the alliance of leftist and radical right-wing forces which would result in an aggregate loss for the opposition. In addition, even Mr Gyurcsány’s DK refused to run on a joint list with the MSZP, because it nominated the party president’s wife, Klára Dobrev as its top candidate and did not want to bargain on a winning position for her with the Socialists. Even more problematic for the opposition is the probable loss of the votes to be cast for the Liberals (around 1 per cent), the LMP (about 4) and Momentum (about 3) who will hardly reach the 5 per cent threshold. But as Pungor explains, dissolving into a coalition with the MSZP would be even worse for them, for it would mean a loss of identity and result in slow extinction. Meanwhile, he writes, local deals are under active preparation for the local elections next autumn among all those parties.

Tags: Dobrev, EP elections