Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban scored a fourth consecutive landslide win in Sunday's election, as voters shrugged off concerns over Budapest's close ties with Moscow.
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Russia's Feb. 24 invasion of Ukraine had appeared to upend Orban's campaign in recent weeks, forcing him into awkward maneuvering to explain decade-old cozy business relations with President Vladimir Putin. But he mounted a successful campaign to persuade his Fidesz party's core electorate that the six-party opposition alliance of Peter Marki-Zay promising to mend ties with the EU could lead the country into war.
Surrounded by leading party members, a triumphant Orban, 58, said Sunday's victory came against all odds. "We have scored a victory so big, that it can be seen even from the Moon," he said. "We have defended Hungary's sovereignty and freedom."
Preliminary results with about 98% of national party list votes counted showed Orban's Fidesz party leading with 53.1% of votes versus 35% for Marki-Zay's opposition alliance. Fidesz was also winning 88 of 106 single-member constituencies. Based on preliminary results, the National Election Office said Fidesz would have 135 seats, a two-thirds majority, and the opposition alliance would have 56 seats. A far-right party called Our Homeland would also make it into parliament, winning 7 seats. His comfortable victory could embolden Orban, 58, in his policy agenda which critics say amounts to a subversion of democratic norms, media freedom, and the rights of minorities.
Conceding defeat, Marki-Zay, 49, said Fidesz's win was due to what he called its vast propaganda machine, including media dominance. "I don't want to hide my disappointment, my sadness ... We knew this would be an uneven playing field," he said. "We admit that Fidesz got a huge majority of the votes. But we still dispute whether this election was democratic and free."
