After Viktor Orbán's loss in the April 12 election, Hungary's incoming prime minister, Péter Magyar, has vowed to seek justice for crimes committed by his predecessor's network of political allies and the oligarchs who supported them, writes Sonja Ciesnik for France 24.
Corruption is deeply rooted. Orbán has dominated Hungarian politics for years without a serious opponent, and no other figure in the country’s modern history has amassed so much power in such a relatively short period of time.
From the media to the judiciary and from universities to local governments, Orbán’s empire has permeated every state institution. Nothing can be done in Hungary without political connections, one of Hungary’s richest businessmen told the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza in April, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Magyar’s center-right Tisza party won 141 seats in parliament in April’s elections, giving it a large majority to strengthen the rule of law and potentially unlock billions in funding from the European Union, which had frozen allocations under Orbán over concerns about corruption and democratic backsliding. Yet time is of the essence. Magyar warned that oligarchs allied with Orban have begun siphoning off assets to the United States, the United Arab Emirates, Uruguay and other far-flung countries.
The Polish experience could provide some insight into the possibilities that exist for Hungary. After a liberal opposition bloc led by Donald Tusk took the lead in parliamentary elections in October 2023, Tusk promised as prime minister to reform Polish institutions after eight years of rule by the right-wing Law and Justice (PiS) party. He promptly fired prominent figures and circumvented some of the legal obstacles left by the previous government.
Magyar conducted a “successful” talks about EU funds with von der Leyen
According to him, the funds will soon be received by Hungary
FRANCE 24 spoke to Balint Magyar, a sociologist, former education minister and author of the book "The Hungarian Octopus: The Post-Communist Mafia State", who claims that Hungary is embarking on not just a change of government, but a complete change of regime.
Magyar has promised to prosecute corrupt officials who were part of the so-called Orbán system. Does he risk falling into the same illiberalism he promised to eliminate, seeking a break with the Orbán years?
Peter Magyar won 53% of the vote in the April 12 vote, which gave him a majority of more than two-thirds in parliament. This means that Orbán's attempts to make electoral legislation more disproportionate have failed. Such a constitutional majority is enough to change any law.
Among the promises made by Magyar during the election was the introduction of a proportional electoral system. The incoming prime minister also promised to limit the maximum term of office for future prime ministers to two terms - a total of eight years. What happened was not a change of government, but a change of regime. A change of government means that the basic values are shared by the competing parties. In a regime, the competing parties do not share the same political values.
Hungarians witnessed the first change of regime in 1990, from a communist dictatorship to a liberal democracy. The second change of regime occurred in 2010, from a liberal democracy to an autocracy. Orbán called it a "revolution at the ballot box". In 2011, he quickly pushed a new constitution through parliament without any public consultation (called the Fundamental Law of Hungary, the new constitution codified a new interpretation of history and ethno-nationalist principles).
Hungary’s victory represents the third regime change in Hungary’s recent history, from an autocracy – hopefully – back to a liberal democracy. The incoming prime minister has promised to hold a referendum on a new constitution.
How difficult will it be to prosecute high-ranking officials like Péter Szijjártó, the minister of foreign affairs and trade, who reportedly leaked information about EU summit discussions to Russia?
In an attempt to turn the page on Orbán’s term, Magyar has promised to prosecute officials and corporate leaders accused of corruption. During his campaign, he launched a program called "The Road to Prison". This is not an ordinary kind of corruption. If you look at the international scene, you can see the charges brought against Poland’s former deputy justice minister in the "PiS" government, Marcin Romanowski, or against Romanian politicians. These are minor cases compared to the scale of the state plunder committed by the politicians and oligarchs of the Orbán clan.
The "Fidesz" government functioned like a mafia state. All contributing members of society were subordinate to it. It was a political enterprise that captured the state, the economy, and the oligarchs. The mafia state had two motivations: monopolizing political power and accumulating personal and family wealth. With the ability to unilaterally appoint the heads of the supervisory bodies and the presidents of the republic, the central bank, the constitutional court, the general prosecutor's office and the state treasury, Orbán could exercise direct coercion and blackmail over the entire society. Since all these figures were subordinate to Orbán, he could run the state as a criminal organization. Most of these participants and oligarchs associated with Orbán have committed crimes, according to the existing Hungarian legal code.
Magyar called on all heads of the aforementioned institutions to resign. If they do not comply, he will use legal means to remove them from their posts.
The police have already started investigations, although the Hungarian government has not yet taken office. I do not think that ordinary loyalists will be prosecuted. What we will witness is the complete collapse of the mafia-state organization led by Orban.
Also, the difference between the Hungarian and Polish cases is that the Polish leader of the PiS party, Jarosław Kaczyński, is an autocrat, but not a criminal, while Orban was both an autocrat and a criminal.
There will be widespread legal proceedings, although I have some doubts that the stolen state assets will be recovered. (According to the Financial Times, wealthy Hungarians are leaving the country and transferring financial assets.)
Orban was removed from power, but once in an interview with an Austrian tabloid he stated that "he would like to tie the hands of the next government. And not only the next one, but the next 10 governments". How big a threat do he and Fidesz pose to the incoming government?
Orbán’s defeat in the last elections represents not only a political but also a complete moral collapse. There is a difference between a mafia state and a "classic" mafia. The positions in the classic mafia are informal: they can bribe civil servants if necessary, but they operate mostly outside government bodies.
In the case of the mafia state, the positions are within the state apparatus. Having won a constitutional majority, Hungary’s center-right "Tisza" party could reclaim these political and administrative positions. Orbán’s political-economic clan is therefore facing an inevitable collapse.
A national opinion poll published this week asked Hungarians about the main reason for Orbán’s defeat. About 49% say it's corruption, about 18% say it's the bad economy, and about 10% blame the government's lies. This represents the dual nature of the widespread popular discontent - namely the complete immorality and incompetence of the Orbán regime.