Vona re-elected as Jobbik leader

Left-wing and centrist commentators think that Gábor Vona wants to increase his own power in order to shift the radical party to the centre and challenge Fidesz from there.

On Sunday, the Jobbik Congress re-elected Gábor Vona as leader of the party, and also approved the new Vice-Presidents named by Vona after his move to purge the party leadership of radicals resisting his policies (see BudaPostApril 25).

Népszabadság in a front page editorial suggests that Jobbik may split sooner or later. Vona, despite being the only candidate for party leadership only got 80 percent of the votes, which shows that the radical wing is still strong, and may at some point blow up the party, the leading left-wing daily suspects.

A more moderate Jobbik can cause PM Orbán a headache, Péter Somfai comments in Népszava. The left-wing pundit thinks that as Fidesz becomes increasingly radical in its rhetoric, Vona wants to steer his party towards centre stage in order to connect with more moderate voters dissatisfied with the current government. Somfai thinks that unless PM Orbán tones down his party’s combatant radical messages, Vona may eventually convince the public that Jobbik is a more moderate party than Fidesz.

Gábor Vona is copying PM Orbán, Szabolcs Dull writes on Index. Following the example of PM Orbán in restructuring Fidesz, Vona’s aim is to increase his own power within the party by marginalizing his critics and possible future challengers, Dull notes.

Tags: far-right, Fidesz, Jobbik, Vona