Orbán faces the biggest challenge of his political career

Kester Eddy is a British journalist and writer based in Budapest, Hungary.

Hungary’s pugnacious Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, the European Union’s longest-serving national leader, is facing the biggest crisis of his 14-year term in office.

On Feb. 10, Katalin Novak, the president who Orbán propelled to the post, resigned under immense pressure, along with former Minister of Justice Judit Varga. Varga was slated to head Orbán’s Fidesz party list in the European Parliament election this June.

As quickly became apparent, in April 2023, Novak had secretly signed a clemency order, quashing the sentence of a former deputy head of a children’s home — the official had been convicted of attempting to cover up the sexual offenses of the home’s then director. Varga had subsequently co-signed the document, as required by law.

Such a pardon would be controversial in any democratic country. But in Orbán’s Hungary, which has made “Christian-conservative” values — particularly the “protection of children” — the pillars of government policy, this scandal is especially serious. All the more so since Novak had been the devoted Catholic standard bearer of Orbán’s pro-family family policies.

The Hungarian prime minister, who has championed the clean, moral, conservative life for so many years, was well and truly hoisted by his own petard — and via his favored servants at that. The question now is whether he can ride out the storm once more.

In response to the scandal, Hungary’s weak and generally divided opposition parties were united, calling for both women’s heads. But sensing the danger, Orbán acted swiftly: “I have five children and six grandchildren, and if someone were to lay a hand on them, my first thought would be that the molester should be cut in half, or cut into pieces,” he declared in a video. He subsequently pledged to amend the constitution to prevent any future head of state granting clemency to convicted pedophiles.

For such criminals there should be “no mercy,” he thundered. And less than 48 hours later, both Novak and Varga were gone.

But nobody doubts this was all at Orbán’s personal behest. Indeed, many believe he sanctioned the original pardon. And yet, so far, so much damage limitation.

True, some of the Fidesz faithful were shocked — at least those who bothered to search outside party-friendly news channels, which astonishingly ignored the story at first, then declared it fake news and attempted to deflect blame onto the opposition, before finally latching onto Novak. It’s also true that some of the more thoughtful churchgoers among the ruling party’s ranks may have left the Fidesz fold.

However, such is the standing of the one-time anti-Communist firebrand that, with his robust and seemingly decisive response, one would still expect him to rally most of the doubting faithful around his banner, possibly even emerging stronger in time.

Except this usual scenario would overlook the unexpected variable that is Varga’s ex-husband Peter Magyar.

Viktor Orbán is the one who propelled Katalin Novak to the presidential post | Alex Halada/AFP via Getty Images

Magyar’s career progressed well under the Orbán administration. He was the head of the country’s Student Loan Centre and held board positions at a clutch of state-controlled companies. But beneath the surface all was not well. Long frustrated with the system — and with his ex-wife now unemployed — Magyar felt free to resign from his positions and launch a broadside against the government on Facebook. 

According to him, the vision of a civic, sovereign, conservative Hungary as propagated by Orbán and Fidesz was nothing but a “political product, a sugar coating that serves only two purposes: to cover up the operation of the power factory and the unaccountable amount of wealth acquisition.”

Next, in an interview on the government-critical Partizan YouTube channel, Magyar lashed out against Minister of the Cabinet Office Antal Rogan — a key member of Orbán’s inner circle with powers over government communications and intelligence services.

Magyar said Rogan had not only amassed riches through his positions, but was the “one-man, unlimited master of the secret services and propaganda,” whose agents had even interfered in his private life with Varga. “Rogan has to go,” he declared.

The video went viral within Hungary, garnering in excess of 1.6 million views within just two days, in a country with a population of little under 10 million. And coming just hours after the Novak-Varga scandal, Magyar’s allegations-cum-revelations left Fidesz in shock.

Such defections from party insiders are almost unprecedented. This isn’t the first time the prime minister has gone through a nasty break with a government official, but previous incidents featured little in the minds of the average voter. By contrast, the well-groomed Novak, who seemingly personified the ideal of the peace-loving, family-defending conservative Christian woman, was a household figure who appeared on state-controlled television daily.

In the days since the scandal, Magyar has now moved on to attacking Orbán’s son-in-law István Tiborcz — who has acquired holdings in hotels, banks and a host of other businesses — as well as Orbán himself. For example, Magyar claims the Hungarian leader once produced a wad of €500 banknotes, passing one to an aide to pay for a packet of special tea as a present for his daughter.

Meanwhile, after considerable dillydallying, Orbán’s spin doctors finally latched onto their line of response this weekend and flipped the argument: Novak and Varga should be seen not as villains but martyrs. Yes, both officials had made serious mistakes, Fidesz parliamentary leader Máté Kocsis argued, but unlike the unscrupulous left-wing leaders of the past, they had accepted the consequences of their mistakes. And their decision to resign “testified to this moral difference” between Hungary’s right and left.

Orbán had a brilliant escape line once more — and after over a week of silence, he milked it to its limits and beyond. Novak, who “we all saw as someone truly cut out to be President of the Republic,” had erred and could no longer “sustain the unity of the nation,” Orbán said in his annual state of the nation speech on Saturday. “While her departure is right, it is a great loss for Hungary,” he lamented.

And though no opposition supporter would consider, even for a moment, that Novak had ever represented “the unity of the nation,” this is genius argumentation — at least for those on the right. And it may well win over many a wavering Fidesz voters in time for June’s local and European elections.

Still, the opposition now has the bit between its otherwise divided teeth. Leaders on both the left and the non-Orbán right slammed the prime minister’s address, pointing out that he was still evading the essential questions: Why had a criminal who sought to cover up for a convicted pedophile been granted clemency? And who had originally proposed this?

Certainly, these were the answers being demanded by the estimated 50,000 protesters who gathered in Budapest on Friday evening.

Despite all this, Orbán’s pliant parliamentary majority remains unthreatened — there’s no such thing as “rebellious backbenchers” in Hungary. But for now, the scandal shows no signs of dying down. And while Orbán has proven himself to be a master tactician throughout his political life, this is by far the toughest challenge of his career.