![End of the Orbán-Era? with Edit Zgut-Przybylska [PODCAST]](https://4liberty.eu/phidroav/2026/04/LEP1_1-1024x1024.png "End of the Orbán-Era? with Edit Zgut-Przybylska [PODCAST]")
What is the expected outcome of the upcoming parliamentary election in Hungary? What are opposition leader Péter Magyar’s chances of winning? Will this be the end of the Orbán-era? Will there be any attempts at rigging the election? And if the Tisza party wins, what direction will it adopt toward the European Union and Ukraine? And how will the election influence the future of Europe? Leszek Jazdzewski (Fundacja Liberte!) talks with Dr Edit Zgut-Przybylska, an Assistant Professor at the Institute of Philosophy and Sociology at the Polish Academy of Sciences and a Research Affiliate at the CEU Democracy Institute.
Leszek Jazdzewski (LJ): Who is going to win in the Hungarian elections on April 12?
Edit Zgut-Przybylska (EZP): We have certainly arrived at the heart of the matter. I have been receiving this question for many months. If this were a standard election within an established liberal democracy, analysts would simply be speculating on the scale of the opposition’s victory. Independent polling companies, which utilize reliable methodologies, indicate a significant lead for the opposition. This would represent their first major victory in twenty years, ending the dominance of Viktor Orbán’s party that began in 2006.
However, this is not a conventional election. Hungary is currently a hybrid regime; therefore, despite polling data suggesting substantial support for the opposition and its leader, Péter Magyar, one must consider the regime’s mobilization capacity. This factor is difficult to quantify using classic polling methods. The regime employs various tactics to reach individuals who might not otherwise participate in the electoral process.
For example, the documentary The Price of a Vote meticulously demonstrates how the regime utilizes intimidation and pressure to secure votes for Fidesz. Vulnerable populations may be coerced with financial incentives or basic necessities, such as food. In some instances, families are threatened with the intervention of childcare services if they do not support the government.
Furthermore, recent changes to the electoral regulations favor Fidesz. Dual Hungarian citizens residing in neighboring countries—such as Serbia and Romania—traditionally support the ruling party and are permitted to vote via postal service, a process susceptible to abuse. There are even reports of deceased individuals remaining on registration lists.
The electoral system also includes ‘winner compensation’ and significant gerrymandering. Consequently, the Tisza party requires a higher number of votes to win an electoral district than Fidesz does. To secure even a simple majority, Tisza likely needs to outperform Fidesz by four to six percent in the popular vote. Given these skewed conditions, the opposition must maintain a tremendously dedicated and engaging approach to overcome such a tilted playing field.
LJ: By Sunday night or Monday morning, will we have any definitive information regarding the results, or must we wait longer for votes from abroad to be processed? In the absence of exit polls, do you believe the results will provide an early indication of a significant majority for Tisza, or will we see claims of victory and celebrations while waiting several days for a final count?
EZP: It is a fair and very important question. I am pleased that you mentioned the overall votes coming from abroad, because they are extremely important. This includes not only the dual citizens in the near abroad countries I previously mentioned, but also individuals such as myself. I am going to vote as a Polish resident but a Hungarian citizen in Warsaw, and this means that my vote is also going to travel, just like the votes of many other people who live elsewhere. Therefore, we would need to wait for those. The level of registration for these votes is very high, which means that the political engagement of the Hungarian people has reached a point not witnessed since 1989. We have not seen this for quite some time.
There has been significant mobilization from the side of the opposition as well. Given that it takes time, it may eventually take a couple of days to count these; certainly, the votes coming from abroad are finalized and counted over approximately one week. It will be finalized around Saturday, but—and it is a big “but”—if there is an unprecedented level of turnout above 75 percent, it indicates there could be a “flip over” where Tisza could win with a very large majority. If that occurs, we will probably know more on Sunday. While we would still need to wait for every cast ballot coming from abroad, the situation would likely be more obvious, resulting in celebrations on the street for those who voted for the opposition.
However, if the race is extremely close, it might not take a week; it might even take a month to figure out what is going to happen. In the scenario of a “laser-thin” close race, if Tisza wins by only a small margin, Fidesz will certainly contest the result, and vice versa. There would be recounts and perhaps even repeated elections in a couple of constituencies. If that is the case, the courts will go back and forth with these issues for weeks. This would not only procrastinate the inauguration of the new government but could eventually lead to a very unstable situation.
Emotions are going to run high, and it is very hard to predict how it will look, but there will likely be social mobilization. Hopefully, it will not result in violence on the street. I believe a very positive thing about the post-transition history of Hungary over the last twenty years is that the toleration of Hungarian society toward violence is very low. What happened in 2006, following the leaked tape scandal of the former socialist government when there was effective political violence, is remembered as one of the worst historical points of Hungary. That eventually led to the collapse of the government, and I think both sides would want to avoid such a situation.
At the same time, the genie is already out of the bottle. There has been hyper-extreme, poisoning polarization for years. We see a country where more than 90 percent of the Hungarian people are going to vote for either Tisza or Fidesz. This is unprecedented; it is not even the case in the United Kingdom, which is a traditional two-party system. I want to emphasize that we have reached a boiling point of hyper-polarization which is not only unprecedented but unbearable. Emotions are running very high, and that is why it is extremely difficult to predict the outcome. There is a lot of responsibility landing on the shoulders of these two leaders not to fuel this, but to cool emotions down. Otherwise, no one truly knows what will happen on the streets of Hungary.
LJ: Do you believe these last-minute interventions will influence the vote, or is the electorate so polarized that most already know their choice, making this effectively a referendum on sixteen years of Fidesz rule?
EZP: It is a combination of all the factors you mentioned; they are not mutually exclusive. What is certainly true is that we are witnessing an unprecedented paradigm shift. Russia is obviously interfering in the Hungarian elections with an array of intelligence-linked operations, information campaigns, and disinformation that we have not seen to this extent before. This indicates that the regime is in significant trouble. Previously, such extensive interference was unnecessary because Viktor Orbán could easily win, especially in the last election where there was no challenger capable of mitigating the regime’s effective “vote-delivering machine.” That machine utilizes dependency structures and rewards to convince people to vote for them—a mechanism I explained in my book on informal power in Hungary and Poland.
However, something has cracked in the last couple of years. The emergence of a genuine challenger has made external interference more prominent. While the exact impact is difficult to measure, the desperation of the government is evident. We have seen domestic hybrid warfare tactics that were previously unimaginable, such as the capture of a Ukrainian “cash convoy” by Hungarian authorities a few weeks ago. It resembled a poorly made action movie. Although investigations are ongoing into this convoy—which has reportedly crossed the country for decades with the knowledge of various beneficiaries—the government used the event to push a narrative that Ukraine is stealing Hungarian money to finance the Tisza party. There was no evidence for this, but it served their primary message: that Ukraine is a corrupt regime threatening Hungarian security, and that voting for the opposition means “everyone is going to die for Ukraine.”
Previously, the message was simply that one must vote for Viktor Orbán as the “man of peace” to avoid being dragged into war by the opposition. The government likely realized that this narrative is no longer as effective; polling shows that Hungarian society is experiencing “war fatigue.” Much like in the previous campaign in Poland where the Law and Justice (PiS) party lost power, the Hungarian people’s concerns have shifted toward living standards, crumbling public services, and the country’s increasing isolation within Europe. There is a growing anxiety about being completely isolated and becoming a “new Belarus.”
The current propaganda is failing to overlap with public sentiments. People are increasingly anxious about a corrupt regime that does business with Moscow and China while constantly fighting with the European Union. This is pushing Hungary to the periphery of a multi-speed EU, to the point where diplomats in NATO and the EU are reluctant to engage with the Hungarian government. This isolation fuels the dissent and rejection we are seeing. It appears the regime has lost touch by continuing to push the same narratives about Ukraine. Whether these last-minute interventions will effectively impact the outcome remains to be seen in two days, but so far, the polls suggest the government’s efforts have been inconsistent and far less efficient than in the past, as the public looks beyond the issue of Ukraine.
LJ: Considering the level of state capture, do you believe the Tisza party can deliver on its promises, or is there a risk that a government without a constitutional majority would be short-lived and unable to prevent Fidesz from regaining power within four years?
EZP: That is another good question. The outcome really boils down to the size of the majority for the new government. If it is “laser-thin,” it will be an uphill battle and extremely difficult for many reasons. One of the primary issues is the captured institutions and the environment itself, but that is not all. It will also be significantly more difficult to unfreeze European Union funds, which is the top priority for a Tisza government. They would focus intensely on unfreezing and bringing that money home, because the national budget is empty; mathematically, it would not be possible to deliver on their promises or elevate living standards without those funds.
If they achieve a constitutional majority, things would become much smoother. This would allow them not only to push decisions and launch the reinstitutionalization of democratic institutions but also to “change the guard.” The most difficult part will be dealing with the European Union. Comparing the situation to Poland, the Polish government had much more time to maneuver. For Tisza to secure those EU funds and not lose them forever, the deadline is August. If we assume a new government takes office in May, they would have only two-and-a-half or three months to perform the same “magic trick” that the Donald Tusk government had over a year to accomplish.
Furthermore, unlike in Poland where the government faced the veto power of the President, the conditions here are unique. Viktor Orbán’s government has locked the most important regulations as “cardinal laws” in the constitution, which can only be changed with a constitutional majority. I reviewed these recently and found cardinal laws mentioned seventy-two times across thirty-two areas, including property rights, party financing, and media capture. These are areas the new government must change to demonstrate that Hungary is a functioning rule-of-law country.
Without a constitutional majority, the new government would need to find ways to remain “legalistically tight” while perhaps seeking solutions through lower-level courts. I am not a lawyer, so I will not provide a seminar on legal remedies—it would be beneficial to have a legal expert explain those exact mechanisms. However, the success of these procedures will certainly depend on the size of the new government’s majority, and we will soon see how that unfolds.
LJ: Given Péter Magyar’s history as a Fidesz insider and his controversial rise through the release of private recordings of his ex-wife, to what extent do his charismatic yet power-hungry personality pose both a chance and a risk for the restoration of Hungarian democracy? Do you share the concern that he might simply replace one illiberal leader with another, using whatever means necessary to both gain and subsequently retain power?
EZP: You are articulating concerns shared by many Hungarians who were initially hesitant to support him. The way he has built his current majority is quite unique; his supporters often refer to him as a “hammer.” Despite an intense and unprecedented propaganda campaign—which has branded him a traitor, an abuser, and a foreign agent across eighty percent of the media for over two years—his image has remained largely intact. People are so desperate for a figure who can effectively strike at the government on issues of corruption, failing public services, and poverty that they have overlooked his personal controversies.
The government has effectively broken its social contract. Previously, voters accepted corruption because they felt they were also beneficiaries of the system; now, they see the country becoming one of the poorest in the European Union while the elite continues to profit. This is the narrative Péter Magyar has successfully exploited: that the system is no longer working for the average citizen.
Regarding the risk of him establishing a “newly labeled” autocracy, there are significant constraints that may prevent this, even if it were tempting. His primary objective is to restore Hungary’s position within the European mainstream and unfreeze EU funds. To be welcomed back into the European family and receive that financial support, he must adopt a fundamentally different strategic approach. Maintaining an informal power structure or further “butchering” the rule of law would be a poor strategic move if he wants to achieve those goals.
Furthermore, the Tisza party is running on a platform specifically dedicated to restoring democracy. Magyar has promised several reforms, such as introducing term limits for the Prime Minister—limiting himself to two cycles—and giving veto powers to ministers to decentralize authority. Even before Viktor Orbán’s tenure, the Hungarian system was naturally “Chancellor-centric” and concentrated power in the Prime Minister’s office. While the current regime has twisted this further, Magyar has expressed a clear intention to do things differently. We will see if he follows through, but as it stands, continuing the same authoritarian path would contradict his necessity to bring Hungary back from the periphery of the European Union.
LJ: Are there methods by which Viktor Orbán could manipulate the election results or prevent Péter Magyar from assuming governmental power if he loses?
EZP: I began our conversation by discussing how vulnerable individuals are coerced and forced to vote for the government. We do not know the exact number of people subjected to this; it is something we will only witness on Sunday. Methodologically, it is very difficult to measure because people will not readily admit they are being forced to vote for the regime against their will.
The reason I emphasize this is that we could face a scenario where Tisza wins the popular vote on the party list, yet Fidesz secures more mandates in Parliament due to the design of the system. As I mentioned, the “winner compensation” system and gerrymandering make it easier for the government to allocate extra mandates to themselves. They have more constituencies in rural areas with smaller populations where they are popular, while the opposition faces more densely populated districts. This could lead to a horrifying scenario on Monday where the public sees that Tisza won the popular vote, but Fidesz still holds more parliamentary mandates. People will not understand this; they will claim the election was fraudulent.
Such a situation would be extraordinary and would likely lead to significant tension in the streets, as the public would struggle to process such an outcome. I sincerely hope we avoid this scenario. Another probable scenario is an extremely close race resulting in constant legal challenges in single constituencies as Fidesz attempts to flip the majority back in their favor. The captured courts and state agencies provide an institutional environment that could certainly slow the transition of power.
Ultimately, if there is a decisive majority, the President must name the leader of that majority as Prime Minister. Even if the President initially chose Viktor Orbán, the Parliament could immediately withdraw its trust and select a different leader. It will be extremely interesting to see how this unfolds, and I hope we have a decisive outcome within a week.
LJ: Let us hope that democracy wins on Sunday in Hungary.
This podcast is produced by the European Liberal Forum in collaboration with the Movimento Liberal Social and the Fundacja Liberté!, with the financial support of the European Parliament. Neither the European Parliament nor the European Liberal Forum are responsible for the content or for any use that be made of.