Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has got a challenger to his leadership, after opposition party leader Péter Magyar held what he termed the largest rural political rally in the country’s recent history on Sunday.
Newcomer Magyar, who has emerged as a possible PM in a matter of months, has vowed to end government corruption and stop declining living standards.
About 10,000 people came together in Debrecen, Hungary’s second-largest city, to hear the Tisza [Respect and Freedom] leader.
Magyar told attendees: “Today, the vast majority of the Hungarian people are tired of the ruling elite, of the hatred, apathy, propaganda and artificial divides. Hungarians today want cooperation, love, unity and peace.”
Magyar, formerly of Orbán’s Fidesz party, has had the country’s leader in his sights since Febuary. He has accused the nationalist leader of as heading up an entrenched “mafia state”. Magyar has also promised to scrap what he calls the government propaganda machine.
Tisza will field 12 candidates in the upcoming European Union elections, with Magyar appearing first on the party list. Tisza has also said it will field four candidates in the Budapest council elections.
His rally on Sunday in Debrecen, a heartland for Orbán’s ruling Fidesz party, reflects Magyar’s willingness to go after voters in Orbán’s areas of strength, such as rural parts of the country.
The Mother’s Day rally was the latest in a nationwide tour, which has seen Magyar speak in dozens of cities, towns and villages, often drawing significant crows. Indeed his speeches regularly see numbers that few Orbán critics have ever been able to amass in rural areas.
New polls show that Tisza may be the largest opposition party just over a month out from the election. Polling company Median this week put the party at 25 percent among certain voters, with Orbán’s Fidesz still ahead on 45 percent.
Orbán and has party has been in power in Hungary with a constitutional majority since 2010.
