Considering that Ukraine is at the centre of Hungary’s increasingly turbulent election campaign ahead of the 12 April vote, it is rather ironic that one of the most accurate accounts of the country’s political atmosphere comes from a Ukrainian journalist. Yet this is precisely the case with a recently published article covering one of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s rallies, written by Svyatoslav Khomenko, a reporter for BBC Ukraine.

At the outset, Khomenko highlights what is the result of manipulated polling data and wishful reporting by the Hungarian opposition and Western mainstream media. ‘I have been reading quite a lot suggesting that the outcome of the elections in Hungary is essentially already decided—that Orbán is a spent force, and that the only real question is whether the Tisza party will secure a simple majority or immediately a constitutional one,’ he writes.

Khomenko travelled to the town of Pécel, where Orbán held a rally as part of his nationwide tour launched after 15 March to maximize voter mobilization ahead of the high-stakes election. In the article, he outlines seven impressions from the event, most of which contradict the picture painted by opposition and Western media coverage.

First, Khomenko observes that Orbán is a ‘very strong orator’, adding that the prime minister has not lost touch with reality after more than a decade in power but remains closely connected to his audience. ‘You do not even need to understand Hungarian to notice how he holds the crowd’s attention,’ he notes.

He also emphasizes that Orbán ‘truly commands a massive base of support’, challenging the narrative that the race is effectively over and that the opposition Tisza party holds a decisive—more than 20 percentage points, according to some pollsterts—lead. According to Khomenko, this base consists of ‘people who sincerely believe that Orbán is the best thing that happened to Hungary in its thousand-year history’ and ‘who regard him almost as a member of the family’. He further notes that ‘no organized transport seemed needed’ at the rally, countering frequent claims that government supporters are bused in.

Khomenko adds that Orbán’s voters are ‘for the most part, good, kind and empathetic people’ who ‘genuinely feel sorry for the war in Ukraine’.

‘You do not even need to understand Hungarian to notice how he holds the crowd’s attention’

Recent rallies have also seen disruptions by opposition supporters, including in Pécel. Khomenko recounts that a day earlier in Győr, demonstrators ‘managed to clearly irritate Orbán, who from the stage accused them of working for Ukraine.’ Following the incident, opposition figures and Western commentators, as well as many anti-Orbán accounts on social media, portrayed the prime minister as unstable, mentally broken, drawing comparisons to former Romanian dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu.

Khomenko rejects this interpretation. ‘Orbán demonstrated that he remains a formidable political animal (in the Aristotelian sense, of course), capable of learning from his mistakes,’ he writes, noting that the prime minister responded to the disruption with ‘calm strength’.

One of Khomenko’s key conclusions is that Orbán’s speech did not resemble that of ‘a man who is losing’. He argues that the government ‘objectively has tangible achievements to present to his voters’, listing ‘very low utility costs, relatively low fuel prices, a 13th-month salary and pension, [and] preferential tax regimes for young people’.

In closing, Khomenko highlights a structural issue in Hungarian polling: many Orbán supporters refuse to respond to surveys and are therefore underrepresented in polling data, making forecasts ‘extremely difficult’. ‘And that is precisely why the Hungarian elections are currently the most fascinating political spectacle unfolding on the European continent,’ he concludes.

The surprisingly honest and factually correct reporting has also caught the attention of senior Hungarian government officials, including Political Director of the prime minister Balázs Orbán. In a post on X, he highlighted that ‘reality on the ground tells a very different story than the one pushed in the international press,’ adding that in April, ‘Hungarians will make their decision based on what they see with their own eyes.’

Related articles: