Paul Lendvai
48 μ¢¤³£ ¬μμ¬
languages—a stark contrast to the
Fidesz leaders, who were mostly law-
yers from rural areas or small towns.
Orban and his friends initially admired
the older liberals but soon came to see
them as overweening. In one famous
episode, at a reception for newly elected
parliamentarians, a well-known Free
Democrat approached Orban and, with
a condescending air, adjusted the
younger man’s tie. Orban blushed,
visibly incensed.“LYING OUR HEADS OFF”
In 1991, a poll showed that Orban, who
was not yet 30, was the third most
popular politician in Hungary. Two
years later, he became the president o
Fidesz. The future looked bright. But in
the national elections o 1994, the party
suered a crushing defeat. The former
communists o the Hungarian Socialist
Party quintupled the number o votes
they had received in the prior election and
formed a coalition with the Free Demo-
crats; together, the two parties held over
72 percent o the seats. In contrast,
Fidesz had become the smallest party in
parliament. To Orban and his friends,
this vindicated their distrust o the
older liberals, who had once radically
opposed the communist regime but
were now prepared to join a government
led by former communists.
Seeing no other path to political
survival, Orban committed himsel and
the party to a rightward political shift.
The erstwhile rebels o Fidesz began
dressing conservatively and styling their
hair neatly. Their speeches were now
peppered with professions o faith in
the nation, in Magyar tradition, in the
homeland, in national interests, in
respectability, in middle-class values, inAntall. Fidesz, which had transformed
into a political party, won 22 o the 386
seats in parliament. In opposition, the
party remained true to its youthful
image; Orban and other Fidesz politi-
cians kept their beards, long hair, jeans,
and open-neck shirts. They advocated
liberal reforms and were quick to
condemn nationalist and anti-Semitic
undercurrents in the governing coali-
tion. Orban himsel scoed at the
populist rhetoric o the ruling parties,
whose leaders “reject criticism o
government policy by suggesting the
opposition or media are undermining
the standing o Hungary, are attacking
the Hungarian nation itself,” he said.
Such statements do not augur well
for the future o democracy. Such an
attitude indicates that the leaders o
the ruling parties tend to conÇate
their parties and their voters with the
nation, with the country. Sometimes,
in moments o enthusiasm, they have
the feeling that their power is not the
consequence o a one-o decision o a
certain number o Hungarian citizens
but that they express, in some
mystical manner, the eternal interests
o the entire Hungarian people.This was a fair description o some
elements in the Antall government—
and a prescient foreshadowing o the
populist style that Orban himsel would
later adopt.
Despite their avowed liberalism,
Orban and his Fidesz circle had an uneasy
relationship with an older generation o
liberals, especially those o the Alliance o
Free Democrats, many o whom were
academics from bourgeois (and often
Jewish) families. They were well read,
open to the world, and Çuent in foreign