Orban’s big win in Hungary bears lessons for Turkey’s staid opposition
While Turkey's opposition is seeing a rise in the polls, recent elections in Hungary provide an example for those who think a win is guaranteed.
Diplomacy has been termed “the art of deceit,” but few doubt that Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was anything but sincere when he phoned Hungary’s Viktor Orban today to congratulate him on his landslide victory in Sunday’s parliamentary elections.
Both Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) have been following developments in Hungary with an eagle eye, seeing their own fates intertwined as it were with those of the respective contenders in Sunday’s ballot.
The similarities between Erdogan and Orban, unabashed populists who have ruthlessly hacked away at judicial and media independence, intimidated their opponents and changed the electoral system to ensure their continued dominance, are well known. The system they have created is called “illiberal democracy” — a term coined by Orban himself that roughly consists of retaining enough of a veneer of competition to claim legitimacy.
Erdogan has been in power for nearly 20 years. Orban, who served as prime minister between 1998 and 2002, returned to power in 2010. Sunday’s outcome clinched his fourth consecutive term since then with 53% of the popular vote. The result unleashed a wave of gloating among AKP supporters and calls from the ruling party’s critics for the opposition to take stock.
