Marius Dragomir on the Hungarian Elections: Orbán’s Landslide Victory Will Have Dramatic Consequences

Viktor Orbán’s landslide victory shows the dramatic level of manipulation of the Hungarian society by powerful businessmen and politicians as well as the pro-Russian discourse gaining ground in the past 12 years in Hungary, our Director Marius Dragomir told Hungarian weekly 168 Óra.

Interviewed a day after the Hungarian elections, Marius Dragomir said any free election gave legitimacy to political leaders, but Orbán’s policies had lost any legitimacy a long time ago because of the immoral, often illegal, methods used in cementing his power.

Knowing how captured and controlled the media is in Hungary, the elections showed the dramatic level of manipulation of the Hungarian society by a group of powerful businessmen and politicians. They also show that pro-Russian discourse has gained a lot of ground during the past 12 years,

he said.

Asked about Orbán’s victory speech in which he named Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky as one of his opponents, Marius Dragomir said that with this, Orbán simply and openly expressed his support for the Russian war. “I truly hope that many political leaders will not forget or forgive him,” he said.

Dragomir thinks Orbán’s landslide victory will have a dramatic impact on the EU and probably the rest of the world. First, the unity of the European project is being undermined by the rise of a mafia regime within the EU.

Second, the close relation between the Hungarian state and the Russian authorities will raise serious security concerns in many European countries. Many Europeans will not feel comfortable having a country supportive of the Russian regime in the union. This will lead to tensions in the EU, and many countries will probably want to get rid of Orbán’s Hungary.

Third, Dragomir thinks the Orbán government will play a key role in the escalation of the war across many borders. His alliance with Putin will lead to many problems within the EU and NATO, with tragic consequences.

Marius Dragomir puts the blame firmly on EU leaders for allowing the dismantling of rule of law in Hungary. In 2010, they failed to take steps against the first signs of Orbán’s autocracy.

Looking back, I think they were simply naïve. They thought that the EU has all the mechanisms to protect the union against authoritarian tendencies and that economic dependency will dissuade any kind of Orbáns from building the type of autocracy that he built. They were wrong and they kept feeding his project.

Dragomir thinks Hungary needs EU funds, and Orbán probably thinks he can continue to play EU leaders. Dragomir hopes the EU leaders will stop playing his game. “Orbán has no place in Europe, as he himself has said it. It is now the right time for Europe to isolate him and his oligarchs for good.”

Image: Elekes Andor, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons