Parliamentary elections were held in Hungary on 11 and 25 April 2010 to choose MPs for the National Assembly. They were the sixth free elections since the end of communist era. 386 members of parliament were elected in a combined system of party lists and electoral constituencies. The electoral law does not allow all adult citizens to stand for being elected unless they can validate 500 signatures of other citizens supporting their candidacy. In the first round of the elections, the conservative partyFidesz won the absolute majority of seats, enough to form a government on its own. In the second round Fidesz-Christian Democratic People's Party candidates won enough seats to achieve a two-thirds majority required to modify major laws and the country's constitution.
Background
Fidesz's landslide victory was a result of massive dissatisfaction with and voting in protest against MSZP, the Hungarian Socialist Party, which had been in government since 2002, and it was one event and its consequences especially that provoked resentment: in 2006 Ferenc Gyurcsány, the contemporary Prime Minister of Hungary, delegated by MSZP, made a private speech in front of MSZP party members, in which he, although generally outlining a direction to a new beginning and a moral paradigm change in day-to-day policy making, admitted to having been lying to the general public in different matters through a prolonged time during the campaign running up to the previous election, which had resulted among others in his reelection. This speech surfaced in the press in the Autumn of 2006, and resulted in nationwide protests.
Polls
As polls showed both MDF and SZDSZ would be unlikely to make it into parliament on their own, they have agreed to a limited electoral cooperation. In March 2010, polls also showed that the Hungarian parliament after the election was likely to be completely dominated by Fidesz polling at 53–67% that month, followed by either the ruling Hungarian Socialist Party at 12–22% or newcomer Jobbik at 11–18%.
Opinion polls
Controversies
Following the EU elections of 2009, trends showed the rise of right-wing parties and particularly the far right. In this vein, the foreign media cited ominous trends concerning the election results. Fidesz Member of ParliamentOszkár Molnár said that: "I love Hungary, I love Hungarians, and I prefer Hungarian interests to global financial capital, or Jewish capital, if you like, which wants to devour the whole world, but especially Hungary." He later said that, it was only a response to a Shimon Peres speech in which Peres said that his country aims to "colonise" Hungary when he spoke of Israel's investments abroad, Peres said that Israel was "buying out Manhattan, Poland, Hungary...." Jobbik leader, Gábor Vona, also stirred up controversy with allegations of chauvinism by saying "Hungary is for Hungarians" and must be defended against "foreign speculators". Molnar also claimed that the language of instruction in Jerusalem schools was Hungarian and they were "learning the language of their future homeland". His party at the time, Fidesz, did not denounce his statement but simply said it was "embarrassing". Adding that he would not even consider ousting Molnar from his party or parliamentary faction, as the remark "did not violate the party's bylaws". However, in 2010 he was excluded from the Fidesz, due to these remarks. Instead of him, a Lebanese-origin doctor, Pierre Daher became the Fidesz candidate. Molnár also claimed that pregnant Roma women deliberately try to induce birth defects so they can give birth to "fools to receive higher family subsidies. I have checked this and it’s true; they hit their bellies with a rubber hammer so that they’ll give birth to handicapped kids." In 2011, he denounced Roma women at the Hungarian police authorities. Another Fidesz parliamentarian, Ilona Ékes, wrote to the police to ban a gay pride event in Budapest, saying that homosexuality was a mental illness and demonstrators would scandalise people, as they did in previous years, when homosexual activists imitated sexual intercourse on stage and other activists were allegedly blasphemous. According to Ékes, the demonstrations would harm youngsters, whose school season was to start on the same day. A Hungarian analyst was cited as saying Fidesz tolerates such provocative rhetoric from its members because of fears they would vote for Jobbik instead.
Four Jobbik MPs—Gábor Staudt, Gergő Balla, Zsolt Endrésik and Péter Schön—were removed from their committees because they had failed a vetting procedure that asked whether any MP's maintain contact with groups that engage in "activities that deny the basic principles of a state governed by the rule of law." Staudt, a co-founder of the Magyar Gárda Society—that was banned in 2007—had been on the national security committee, while the other three were on the defence and law enforcement committees. Staudt reacted in saying he found the result to be unconstitutional, and that he would file a criminal report with the interior minister against Defence of the Constitution Office director general László Balajti. The four would, however, continue to be MPs.
