25 October 2012
The celebrations to mark the anniversary of the Hungarian revolution were used this year to highlight the political partisanship of all and sundry. Milla, the anti-government protest group, managed to assemble several thousand disparate protesters – all determined to display their anti-Fidesz credentials. No million I hear you ask? What do they stand for?
Other than a passionate dislike of the current Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his government, nobody really knows. You get the impression that they are just homeless Liberals. Their leader and protester-in-chief, Péter Juhász, has nothing to say but gives a fair impression of being a former naughty schoolboy who dislikes authority.
Milla also provided a platform for former technocrat Prime Minister, Gordon Bajnai, who took the opportunity to launch his campaign to oust the Orbán government – or did he? Bajnai’s speech was typical of the vacuous statements made by most of the political elite in Europe – long on rhetoric and short on substance. Surely if Bajnai has credible policies, it might have been a good idea to share them with the Hungarian people? It was not to be.
Of course this much-hyped event did not include any real members of the Hungarian opposition. The Socialists stayed away and LMP stayed very far away. The new party of Ferenc Gyurcsány also decided to stay away and noted that Bajnai in particular was making a mistake in appearing on the same platform as Milla. Jobbik, as expected, wasn’t invited, which is somewhat surprising as many of them are natural socialist voters.
All in all, would this incoherent opposition frighten Fidesz? I don’t think so either!
Despite what sections of the Hungarian media would have you believe, the Hungarian political opposition, as it stands, would be hard put to win the next election let alone acquire a two-thirds majority, assuming that they could work together and find a common platform.
The Socialists are simply unable to come up with a credible alternative to government policy. Someone has told Attila Mesterházy that he should seek to position himself in the centre but unfortunately for him, the political centre is more to the right than 2010. It is one thing to pledge more progressive taxation and social spending but another to ask taxpayers to pay for it. Where is this extra cash that he can extract from a country, which is not shy about tax avoidance and tax evasion? Does he really think that Fidesz will not make financial pledges of their own at the next election – pledges they might keep? Until Mesterházy actually defines what is a socialist in today’s Hungary, he will remain unelectable. Actually, come to think of it, the grandees of the Socialist Party think he is unelectable anyway. If I could give some advice to Attila, it would be to build a robust position of strength in the party and from there, attack and defeat any opposition on the left. He will certainly lose this election but he will be better prepared for 2018.
As for the LMP it really is hard to consider them a national party. Nothing they say suggests they have any affinity with the millions of Hungarians who do not represent the chattering classes of Budapest. Frankly, they have as much credibility as Jobbik and that’s not much.
That brings us to Gordon Bajnai, the man who believes that he is best placed to defeat Orban. If the Milla event told us anything it is that he is a lousy public speaker. However, that is irrelevant. What is relevant is that the Hungarian media has given him an easy ride and has failed to ask some key questions, first among them being why he wants power?
Bajnai typifies the new breed of technocrat much loved in Brussels – no interest in democratic process, disdainful of the election process, no public political backing and no discernible political ideology. He simply wants power for powers sake and the influence that comes with it. There was a time not so long ago when political opportunists were exposed for what they are. His economic thinking – at least that which he espouses in interviews – is simply a regurgitation of the traditional orthodoxy much loved by the bankers and financiers who contributed so much to the economic malaise in which we find ourselves. He favours multi-national solutions, whether it is the EU or the IMF, because that takes away the need to think about national solutions. Has he not recognised that the Harvard Business School approach to economics has been found wanting? This is the man who criticised Orbán’s windfall tax on banks but now has been wrong-footed by the EU’s decision to do the same – smart political operator he is not!
You will notice of course that I have said little of Ferenc Gyurcsány as an element of the opposition. The reason is simple – the former Prime Minister remains toxic and any political party that associates with him will hardly benefit, if at all. His recent pronouncements on Bajnai and Mesterházy – that the former has made a tactical mistake aligning with Milla and the latter is unelectable – makes me believe that he has yet to come to terms with his fall from grace.
Finally, what have the opposition to say on some very serious questions about Hungary’s future and its relationship with the EU? Even ostriches are aware that the EU is changing, much of it in response to the global financial crisis. The EU has never been so removed and out of touch with the citizens of Europe. Financial dysfunction and bankruptcy is pushing the inner core to full economic union and many will become second tier members or worse, outside the neo-EU. The European model of social welfare is being shredded year by year as the reality sets in that financing this model is unsustainable.
While the opposition decry the government for being brittle with the IMF and EU, where do they stand on national priorities and how this will fit in with the new Europe? How much of the national identity and sovereignty are they prepared to cede to an EU which is more than ever directed from Berlin? Uncomfortable as this may be, they need to let the Hungarian people know where they stand. Or maybe not . . . maybe they haven’t thought that far.
As opposition goes, Hungary really does deserve better!