Just six months ago, it would have been almost unthinkable. Today, however, one of the main questions facing Fidesz is whether the party should survive in its current form at all. So how did we get here?
We do not need particularly sophisticated political analysis to understand the scale of Fidesz-KDNP’s defeat in April. Tisza won 141 seats, while the former governing parties, now pushed into opposition, managed to retain just 52 MPs. Compared with 2022, the right-wing alliance lost around 60 per cent of its parliamentary seats and almost 90 per cent of its individual constituencies.
There is, however, one rather important catch: Fidesz did not disappear.
The party still received 38.6 per cent of the party-list vote, meaning that almost 2.5 million Hungarians voted for it. For comparison, in 2014 Fidesz won a two-thirds majority with fewer votes.
Of course, it would be a mistake to assume that every one of those voters is a committed Fidesz supporter. By exactly the same logic, not all of Tisza’s more than three million voters are necessarily devoted supporters of Péter Magyar either. What is beyond dispute, however, is that there remains a serious, multi-million-strong electorate that currently feels closer to the former governing camp than to Magyar.
And somebody will have to represent those voters. The big question is: who?
Fidesz could lose more than the election – it could lose its political succession
Tisza is already attempting to answer that question in its own way. The new 12-year parliamentary term limit could trigger a genuine personnel earthquake on the Hungarian right.
Under the new rules, anyone who has spent at least 12 years in Parliament, or has been elected as an MP three times, will no longer be eligible to serve as a member of the National Assembly.
The numbers are striking.
The rule would affect almost half of the current Fidesz parliamentary group, including a large number of politicians who have represented the party for years, and in some cases decades.
That means both renewal and loss.
It is possible to find new faces. But can a political force build, within a relatively short period of time, a new generation with the same level of recognition, experience and discipline?
That is a much harder question.
Has the Fidesz brand simply grown tired?
Perhaps the bigger problem, however, is the brand itself.
After sixteen years in government, the name Fidesz simultaneously represents power and experience, but also an enormous political burden. What was once an advantage may now have become a liability.
The obvious solution would appear to be a new party.
On paper, that sounds simple. In reality, it is anything but.
Fidesz has spent decades building a nationwide organisation, political network and voter base. A new name would not automatically inherit any of that.
The dilemma is therefore brutal: how do you renew Fidesz without losing the voters who are still prepared to support it?
And increasingly, there are signs that the old structure itself no longer considers its position entirely secure.
In July, Gergely Gulyás stepped down as parliamentary group leader, while Péter Szijjártó also surrendered his parliamentary mandate. By the end of the month, reports were already circulating that 10–15 per cent of the Fidesz parliamentary group could be replaced by the end of the year.
Then came another political bombshell: János Lázár.
The former minister announced on 20 August that he was resigning his parliamentary mandate with immediate effect. His explanation was particularly revealing. In his view, the period since the election had demonstrated that the renewal of the party had become more important than political continuity.
That is not the language of a political force that believes everything is business as usual.
And then Tibor Navracsics appeared
While one well-known Fidesz politician used the national holiday to leave Parliament, another, Tibor Navracsics, chose the same day to announce his return to the political front line.
On 20 August, Navracsics and Orsolya Ferencz launched something called the “Civic Democrats”.
What exactly it is remains unclear for now. The announcement stresses that the initiative is not about establishing a new political party, but about creating dialogue between Hungary’s opposing political camps.
According to Navracsics, the extreme confrontation between the two sides is already damaging the country’s ability to function.
There is another particularly interesting detail here.
Navracsics did not announce that he was leaving Fidesz. For the time being, he therefore appears to be trying to build something new within the framework of his existing party.
Older observers may find that approach somewhat familiar.
Ferenc Gyurcsány did something similar in 2010, when he established the Democratic Coalition Platform within the Hungarian Socialist Party. We all know what happened next.
Is there actually a good solution?
One thing seems increasingly clear: the old Fidesz has become tired, while the new Fidesz has not yet been born.
The old brand could gradually lose even those voters who remained loyal in April. But creating an entirely new right-wing party and persuading more than two million people to transfer their loyalty to it would be an enormous – perhaps impossible – task.
This is why the coming months may not simply be about how Fidesz behaves in opposition.
They may be about something much more fundamental.
Does the political story continue under the name Fidesz at all?
Or will the political community that dominated Hungary for more than a decade and a half eventually have to find a new name, a new structure and perhaps a new generation of politicians?
For now, the answer is still unknown.
But for the first time in many years, the most important question facing Fidesz may no longer be how to win the next election.
It may be whether Fidesz, as we know it, will still exist when that election arrives.
Featured image: illustration made by artificial intelligence (AI).
