Former PM Gyurcsány: Opposition either wins together or not at all

Ferenc Gyurcsány, the leader of the Democratic Coalition, has called on Hungary’s opposition parties to join forces, saying: “Either we’ll win together or we won’t win at all”.

In his annual speech on Sunday, the former Socialist prime minister said the opposition parties came from many different backgrounds, with different pasts and political tastes. “They don’t have to love each other, but they should love the homeland,” he said.

Gyurcsány said the opposition parties should not ignore their constituents. If they did win the 2022 general election, he added, they would be able to form a government only by joining together.

“It’s far better for a country to have a coalition government forced to compromise than an ignominious, selfish single party of the state,” he said.

Gyurcsány said a coalition government’s duty went far beyond linking together party lists. “Those who can’t stand each other while campaigning are hardly going to stand each other in government,” he said, adding that unless there was “an understanding that the opposition is diverse, there will not be an acceptance that the country needs greater diversity and understanding”.

Gyurcsány praised the Socialist Party for its efforts to help the disadvantaged. He also welcomed the Jobbik party’s efforts to turn itself into a “decent, nationalist, conservative party” after its “awful past”.

He said the Momentum Movement’s members were “young, dynamic and sometimes cheeky, but have introduced a new generation of hundreds of thousands to politics.” Gyurcsány also noted that the Greens, formerly known as LMP, had filed a criminal complaint against him a few years ago. “But this doesn’t matter.”