What about our dreams?

Hungary finished 22nd in the final of the Eurovision Song Contest and the first comments blamed the deceiving result on the country’s poor international image.

János Sebők, a veteran expert on pop music who now regularly comments on public affairs in the liberal weekly HVG believes the Hungarian song, entitled „What about my dreams” in English, would have deserved more votes from the European TV viewers, and suspects that its poor ranking was due, among other things to „the decline of Hungary’s international prestige since the régime change 21 years ago”. READ MORE

Gypsies: a scapegoat for a frustrated majority

Hungary’s 600 thousand Gypsies are the biggest losers of the regime change in Hungary, but the majority of the population do not identify themselves among the winners either. Ethnic distrust and conflicts are an inevitable consequence. Two decades of political correctness imposed by left wing-liberal intellectuals only served to deepen the crisis.  It may come as a surprise that this opinion should have been published in Demokrata, the passionately right wing pro-government weekly that is often accused of racist inclinations. The author of this thorough analysis, on four full pages, without ever blaming any community for the worrying developments is the weekly’s publisher, Gábor Bencsik (brother of the editor in chief András Bencsik) who recently received his PhD degree with a dissertation on the perception of Gypsies in 19^th Century Hungary. READ MORE

Liberal Commentator Cautions against Gyurcsány

Former Socialist Party chairman and Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány “is not the man capable of resurrecting Hungarian liberalism from the ashes, but is rather one capable of taking the place of and sucking the air from a missing, authentic Hungarian liberal party” – argues Hungary’s number one liberal commentator Sándor Révész in Élet és Irodalom. READ MORE

“Clash of civilizations” continues over new constitution

„Viktor Orbán must fall” philosopher János Kis tells the leftist weekly 168 Óra, “before the new Constitution can be repaired”.  Kis, now a professor at the Central European University in Budapest, was a respected dissident leader during the last decade of communism in Hungary, then founding president of the liberal Party of Free Democrats in 1988. He left his party in 2002 but remains an undisputed authority among left wing liberals. READ MORE

Everybody’s fault but ours

Another battlefield of the twenty year old clash of two opposing world outlooks in Hungary is the plight of the six hundred thousand strong Roma/Gypsy minority. In March Jobbik, the radical right wing party held a march at Gyöngyöspata, a village of 2,800 inhabitants in northern Hungary, blaming the local Roma (who make up about a quarter of the population) for the suicide of an elderly resident. READ MORE

Ex PM under investigation

“Viktor Orbán has lost his marbles”, according to Zsolt Gréczy, an aid to former Socialist Premier Ferenc Gyurcsány. In his blog on Stop.hu he accuses the Prime Minister of having instructed the Chief Prosecutor to ask Parliament to suspend Mr Gyurcsány’s immunity. READ MORE

How far to the right?

Hungary after the elections

The April parliamentary elections resulted in a sweeping victory for the right-wing parties. Center right Fidesz secured an absolute majority, and, while left-wing parties suffered an unprecedented blow, the extreme right-wing Jobbik got into Parliament  with 16,7 percent of the popular vote. How will Fidesz govern after the landslide victory? Will it weaken democratic institutions by introducing authoritarian measures, or will it start painful and supposedly unpopular structural reforms? Does Fidesz see the extreme right an ally as some left wing liberal intellectuals fear, or will it face the radical challenge by moving to the center? READ MORE

An impotent opposition?

A centrist commentator lists the failings of the opposition. READ MORE