Ok, Hungarians. I know you are out there reading this blog. Occasionally you comment, but now I am asking you to comment. Tell me about your elections that are going on right now. What are the parties? What do they stand for? Who are you supporting, and why? Who are you against, and why? I'm very curious and I can't find much anything in English besides wikipedia articles, which I don't much trust.
Legyetek udvariasok is, legyetek szívesek!
13 comments:
The main parties are MSZP and Fidesz. MSZP is said to be the leftist party, this is the governing party now, most of the members had important role in communist Hungary.
The other party is Fidesz. It's said to be rightist, but has a lot of leftist character. Fidesz will definitely win the elections, most of the people are tired of MSZP, during the last few months a lot of scandals, corruptions were revelead, and the society wants change.
The third important party is Jobbik. This is the radical, nationalist, fascist, anti-semitic party, and very popular recently because a lot of people believe only Jobbik can solve the problems of Hungary.
The main questions of the elections are, will Fidesz be able to gain two-thirds majority? Can Jobbik defeat MSZP and gain more votes?
As Daniel has said before, MSZP (short for Magyar Szocialista Párt, Hungarian Socialist Party) is a direct descendant of the communist party that ruled Hungary for forty years before 1990. They lost the first elections, but won in 1994 and again in 2002 and 2006, becoming the first party to win two elections in a row, albeit both with very small margins, which gave rise to speculations that they manipulated the elections.
Fidesz (short for Fiatal Demokraták Szövetsége, Association of Young Democrats, and also for Latin "fides", or "trust", if I am not mistaken) started out as an opposition party of liberal youth, then with a swift turn became a Christian-conservative burgeouise (did I spell that right?) party and won the elections in 1998, and ruled for 4 years. Nowadays it seems a populist mixture of leftist economic views on welfare and conservative views on moral values. While the MSZP had several prominent figures and 3 Prime Ministers in the past 20 years, the Fidesz is firmly built around its leader, Viktor Orban.
Other old parties include the conservative-christian MDF (Hungarian Democratic Forum), who won the first elections in 1990, and SZDSZ, (Liberal Democrats' Association), who ruled in coalition with the MSZP, but they are unlikely to make it into the Parliament this year.
In September 2006, a few months after the elections, a speech of Prime Minister Gyurcsany which he gave at a party conference behind closed doors back in May that year was leaked to the press. You can read the entire speech on Wikipedia. In it he admitted that they had been lying about their intentions in during the campaign and had not done any real governing work for two years, for fear of losing the elections. Literally, he said "elkúrtuk", or "we fucked up", which has become a catchphrase since then. It also included what seemed a sincere call for action and meaningful reforms. However, his admitting that they won the elections by false promises made his and the MSZP's rule illegitimate in the eyes of a huge portion of the population, and riots and months-long protests followed in front of the Parliament Building. The riots included the so-called "siege of the TV-building" when the speech was leaked and another riot a month later, on the October 23d national holiday. The latter was met with excessive police brutality and arbitrary arrests of innocent bypassers that are still being investigated until this day. Gyurcsany refused to resign and embarked on the (in fact much needed) reforms of the welfare system. However, these "reforms" were carried out haphazardly, without much thought and were met with more protests and the opposition's obstruction. As the elections drew closer most of the so-called reforms were abandoned, and after the effects of the world economic crisis were felt in the Hungarian economy, Gyurcsany finally resigned last year, giving his seat to Gordon Bajnai and his government.
In addition to the reforms and the economic crisis, a series of corruption scandals came to light. The greatest involves the BKV (Budapest Transport Company). It started last summer and is still going on, and by now has reached the mayor's office. Permanent scandals surround the freeway construction projects, see for example this iconinc bridge over nothing:
http://m.blog.hu/va/vastagbor/image/pix/2008_dec/K%C5%91r%C3%B6shegyi_v%C3%B6lgyh%C3%ADd.jpg
or tunnels burrowed into sandstone hills that later collapsed etc. Such projects make the freeway constructions much more expensive than in neighbouring countries, and are widely believed to serve the financial interests of parties and politicians, i.e., the companies who are awarded the contracts have to pay back part of the money to the government and party officials - therefore, the more expensive, the better. And there are countless other cases.
The past four years eroded the voter support for SZDSZ to zero and support for MSZP has become so low that Fidesz is going to win the elections without doubt. The only question is whether it will gain a two-thirds majority, in which case it could do practically anything, including changing the constitution.
As for the Jobbik ("Better" or "Righter"), it defines itself as "radical nationalist" and wows to protect Hungarian interests above those of multinational companies and such. It is seen by many as a new party with no dark past and murky businessses, and it has grown from a small party with only 1-2% support to a medium party in just a few years. Now it might even gain more votes than the MSZP. Besides its anti-corruption agenda it is also capitalizing on anti-gypsy sentiments, especially in rural areas with high poverty and crime rates.
Besides those listed above, a new leftist-liberal party, LMP (Lehet Más a Politika, Politics Can BE Different) might make it to the Parliament on the wave of dissatisfaction with the current ruling elite.
This comment has become rather long, but is still just a short summary of the ongoing events. To get the complete picture, you need to read the Hungarian press and webpages and blogs and comments. Or ask your Hungarian friends about politics over a glass of beer. Everybody has an opinion. As the saying goes, in Hungary everybody is an expert when it comes to soccer or politics (and we suck at both, I might add).
For the opinion of a fellow American who has lived here since 1990, has built a succesful business, and recently donated 11 million Ft to LMP, see (in Hungarian):
http://mandiner.hu/cikk/erdemi_kerdesekrol_kellene_beszelni
Wow! Thanks for writing so much. :) Struggling through Hungarian sites now...
I agree with Daniel and Iaopan.
Very interesting article with the American-Hungarian entrepreneur too! Yes, that's exactly what's been going on here politically.
The sad thing is that the political parties with the most appealing agendas and values have clearly proved themselves to be more corrupt than any other party before them. So what they say and what they do are two completely different things (MSZP-SZDSZ). I personally like what they say, and dislike what they have been doing.
Fidesz has had their scandals too in the past, but there is still a wide difference of magnitude. They have not been found corrupt in as many scandals as SZDSZ or MSZP.
As for Jobbik, it is clearly a fascist party with the rhetoric of the 1930s. It is just hard to believe so many people buy into that kind of thing even today. And yet a lot of people do!
My grandma, who is 90 years old now, says that Jobbik's Magyar Gárda outfits and their ideologies are the spitting image of what the soldiers of the fascist Arrow Cross Party wore in the 40s. Once in 1945 she was walking in the Buda Castle area and a 16 year-old armed arrow cross guard walked up to her and tore her necklace off and was about to take her bag as well when a passing German soldier came to her rescue and slapped the kid across the face shouting at him in German. After that he apologized to my grandmother.
She says Jobbik's magyar gárda members today walk and talk like the mainly uneducated, unemployed, unskilled and rabid kids of the arrow cross party in 45. They marched about with their machine guns in hand and would often shoot civilians at random after the supposed curfew, of which many people could not have any knowledge, of course. These kids killed their fellow Hungarians indiscriminately while their party was sermonizing about nationalism and the rest. A lot of people died in such attacks. My grandma still breaks into a cold sweat when she sees them on TV. That is Jobbik and the Magyar Gárda basically today.
Seres Mária's civil movement seems interesting. She looks like a well-meaning politician to me, so there we go. I think I will support her.
This was Mate by the way
I read somewhere (possible unreliable Wikepedia) that it was projected that Jobbik would gain 20% of the votes this election. Since I have also read that it is a small party with only 1-2% of the overall vote, and that most Hungarians realize that it might as well be the 30's again, how is this possible? Do people really believe that Jobbik can solve Hungary's problems?
Jobbik was a 1-2% party just 3-4 years ago. It has grown tremendously since then.
I don't think people believe Jobbik can solve Hungary's problem (except maybe that 1-2%). The rest is protest vote. If the Fidesz will feel secure enough in its (possibly 2/3) position to address the most pressing problems, I believe most of Jobbik's support will melt by the 2014 elections.
Personally, if I were in Hungary at the time of the elections, I would vote for LMP. They seem to be a bunch of enthusiastic amateurs, but that's exactly what gives them credibility. They won't solve the problems of the economy, but at least they have an appealing environmentalist attitude. Every other option just seems worse to me.
I feel like this Jobbik party kind of scares me. Laopan said that most of the vote for the party is more of a protest vote which seems unbelievable to me. Mainly because enough protest votes could easily turn into a majority vote if things aren't kept in check. I also feel that their views about Gypsys is reminiscent of Nazi Germany and their views towards the Jewish. What's to stop the Jobbik party from repeating the mistakes of the past if they are in power? Sure the EU could prevent this, but isn't it true that the Jobbik party wants to pull away from the EU anyways?
"What's to stop the Jobbik party from repeating the mistakes of the past if they are in power?"
The Jobbik won't get into power. Their own stupidity is going to prevent them. When they make it into the Parliament this year, everyone will see that they cannot offer any meaningful solution to any problem and their support will evaporate. Except for a few well-meaning and educated individuals, the party officials of Jobbik are morons, and the hard core of their supporters (that 1-2%) are truly awful. I don't believe there is support for radicalism in Hungary, except when it is born of desperation like now.
There are only two ways Jobbik could improve its position by 2014. One is if the Fidesz comes accross as a bunch of even bigger idiots. In this way, the Jobbik's presence in the Parliament is useful, because it will pressure Fidesz to govern well. The other way is if Jobbik will transform itself into a moderate-right party, in which case they won't be dangerous anymore.
Also, keep in mind that for all the Jobbik's rhetoric, and the resemblance between the Garda's costume and old Nazi uniforms, they have never committed any atrocities against Gypsies or Jews. Whereas the real communists of the old regime are still in the MSZP, and many of them has gained a fortune using their position. It's easy to see how Jobbik can be percieved as the lesser of two evils.
Sorry for flooding your comment board. I just would like to add one more quick note. A book was published last week about the Hungarian election system in English. Its title is, very imaginetively, "The Hungarian Election System". I think it can probaly answer most of your questions.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wdBRPVi7uJQ
And the winner is...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8642456.stm
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