Opposition primary vote has been won by a non-party politician

HUNGARY - In Brief 17 Oct 2021 by Istvan Racz

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The second round of the united opposition's primary election, which was intended to select the common candidate for prime minister in next April's parliamentary election, ended last night. It drew 662 thousand voters, 29 thousand more than the first round, meaning truly great electoral interest, especially considering that this was the first vote of its kind in the country's history.The vote has been clearly won by Péter Márky-Zay, a centre-right non-party politician, who currently has a 57% to 43% lead after 65% of the vote counted. His opponent, Klára Dobrev of the centre-left, pro-European politician from DK (Demokratikus Koalíció) has already congratulated the winner, saying that from now on, all constituents of the united opposition will have an obligation to support the now selected new common candidate. Originally, three candidates were selected to take part in the second round of the vote, but one of them, the centrist liberal Budapest mayor, stepped down in favour of the eventual winner. No surprise, Márky-Zay was elected mainly by the votes cast in Budapest, whereas Dobrev appeared to be moderately winning the rest of the country.Even though the political platforms of the two second-round candidates do not fall too far away from each other, the consequences of today's results are largely unclear for three reasons. One is that the common candidates for members of parliament, selected in the first round of the primary, are predominantly from DK and the nationalistic, radical right-wing Jobbik (32 and 29, respectively, out of a total 106 constituencies), and so Márky-Zay currently will probably have a minority among the united opposition's potential parliamentar...