New opposition star announced his party, runs at European election in June

HUNGARY - In Brief 15 Apr 2024 by Istvan Racz

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Péter Magyar, who appeared as an opposition politician just a few weeks ago, and has been ambitiously working to build himself up as a leading figure ever since then, has announced his new party (TISZA Respect and Freedom), and also the fact that this party has been registered by the National Election Committee for the European Parliament election coming up on June 9. As we reported earlier, Mr. Magyar came from the inner circles of the Fidesz regime: he is the ex-husband of former justice minister Judit Varga, and was known as a close friend of cabinet minister Gergely Gulyás, one of the highest ranking people in current government hierarchy. Following the forced resignation of his ex-wife as the leader of Fidesz' list of candidates for the European election earlier this year, he almost immediately turned harshly against PM Orbán, accusing the prime minister's family and key people of massive corruption, and setting the objective to overcome the Fidesz regime, by founding a centre-right party that would win over voters from Fidesz and from the undecided, currently non-voting crowd. He conducted an aggressive media campaign in recent weeks, receiving unparalleled wide publicity in the internet-based independent media. Despite fierce attacks against him in the officially controlled media and on the internet, Mr. Magyar has become increasingly popular. On March 15, a national holiday, he pulled together some 50k people for a street demonstration, surpassing the number of visitors at PM Orbán's similar event held on the same day. On April 6, he held another street demonstration in central Budapest, with close to 100k visitors, according to our own estimate (as politically...