Hungary’s Orban concedes defeat as voters deliver sweeping rebuke to 16-year rule
Record turnout hands opposition Tisza Party a decisive victory in Hungary
Viktor Orban’s 16-year grip on Hungary is over, with the prime minister conceding Sunday’s election in a phone call with Peter Magyar, leader of the main opposition Tisza Party.
“The election result is painful but clear. I congratulated the winning party,” Orban said from his election headquarters in Budapest.
The result is a resounding rebuke to a government marked by authoritarianism and corruption, and by closer ties with Beijing, Moscow and Donald Trump’s Washington over Brussels.
Hungarians turned out in record numbers to deliver it: almost 80 per cent of registered voters cast their ballot according to the national election office, the highest since the fall of communism.
“This time around, people, even in the smallest villages, could see that this inhumane power will lose and Hungary will become free again,” Magyar said shortly after polls closed as he hailed the impressive turnout numbers.
Out of 199 parliamentary seats, Tisza won 138 – enough for a two-thirds supermajority – while Orban’s Fidesz collapsed to just 55 seats, more than halved from the 135 it held going into the election, based on 98.89 per cent of votes counted. The far-right Mi Hazank party will also enter parliament with six seats.
