The pro-European centre-right leader P\u00e9ter Magyar has been sworn in as prime minister of Hungary, marking the official end to Viktor Orb\u00e1n\u2019s 16 years in power.<\/p>\n
Saturday\u2019s ceremony \u2013 during which Magyar had invited people to join him to \u201cwrite Hungarian history\u201d together and \u201cstep through the gate of regime change\u201d \u2013 comes a month after his opposition Tisza party won a landslide victory in parliamentary elections<\/a>.<\/p>\n P\u00e9ter Magyar delivers a speech in parliament after becoming Hungary\u2019s prime minister. Photograph: Bernadett Szab\u00f3\/Reuters<\/p>\n The result sparked jubilation in Budapest and beyond, as Orb\u00e1n and his populist, nationalist movement had long been held<\/a> up by the global far right as an example to emulate.<\/p>\n Minutes after he was sworn in, Magyar said Hungarians had given his party a mandate to launch a \u201cnew chapter\u201d in the country\u2019s history. \u201cA mandate not only to change the government, but to change the system as well. To start again.\u201d<\/p>\n Under Orb\u00e1n\u2019s watch, he said, Hungary had become the most corrupt country in the EU. \u201cOrb\u00e1n\u2019s associates and the elite have a long way to go until they are confronted with what they have done,\u201d he said, vowing that his government would seek justice against those who, even in the last hours<\/a>, were trying to \u201csteal everything\u201d.<\/p>\n He reiterated his earlier calls for Orb\u00e1n-era appointees to resign, asking them to do so by the end of the month. The first should be Tam\u00e1s Sulyok, he said, in a reference to the president who had, moments earlier, nominated Magyar to form a government. Outside parliament, the comment was met with enthusiastic cheers.<\/p>\n P\u00e9ter Magyar during his swearing-in ceremony. Photograph: Bernadett Szab\u00f3\/Reuters<\/p>\n Magyar pledged to build a more inclusive Hungary<\/a>, one that would be more free, humane and hopeful than under Orb\u00e1n\u2019s populist nationalist movement. \u201cWhat connects us will be stronger than what divides us,\u201d he said. \u201cHungary will be home for every Hungarian, and everyone can feel like they have a place in the Hungarian nation. Family, friends and communities will be able to speak to each other again.\u201d<\/p>\n Early on Saturday, people started pouring into the square outside the country\u2019s neo-Gothic parliament to follow along as the inaugural session was broadcast on large screens. At each glimpse of Magyar, the crowd cheered, while some booed lawmakers from Fidesz and the extreme right Our Homeland party.<\/p>\n Many in the crowd had travelled hours to be there. \u201cThis is the first time I feel like it\u2019s good to be Hungarian,\u201d said Erzs\u00e9bet Medve, 68, who had come from Miskolc in north-eastern Hungary. \u201cI feel like I could cry.\u201d<\/p>\n As a school teacher, she had long watched in frustration as Orb\u00e1n and his Fidesz government left the education system deprived of funds. \u201cThe government had enough money, but they didn\u2019t spend it there.\u201d<\/p>\n Left to right: L\u00e1szl\u00f3 Mak\u00e1rdi, 50; Anik\u00f3 Moln\u00e1r Gyul\u00e1n, 60; Erzs\u00e9bet Medve, 68; and Marianna Sz\u0171cs, 70. Photograph: Flora Garamvolgyi<\/p>\n Sitting next to her, Marianna Sz\u0171cs, 70, said she hoped Hungary would become a more livable country. \u201cNow we feel like our children and grandchildren have a future here.\u201d<\/p>\n As she spoke, the crowd behind her began cheering wildly as the newly elected speaker of the house, \u00c1gnes Forsthoffer, announced that the EU flag would be returned to the building after it was taken down by Fidesz in 2014.<\/p>\n The EU flag is returned to the facade of the parliament building. Photograph: Zsolt Czegl\u00e9di\/EPA<\/p>\n Sz\u0171cs said two of her children had had to move abroad. Both of them had lost their jobs, seemingly after she had spoken out against the Fidesz government, she said. \u201cNow we hope they will be able to come home.\u201d<\/p>\n The landslide victory, in which Tisza won 141 seats in the 199-seat parliament, was a stunning outcome for Magyar, who until recently had been a little known former member of Fidesz\u2019s elite. He burst into public view in early 2024, after he turned on the party, laying bare the inner workings of a system he described as rotten and accusing officials of expanding their power and wealth at the expense of ordinary Hungarians.<\/p>\n The new parliament marks the first time since the country\u2019s democratisation in 1990 that Orb\u00e1n \u2013 whose decades-long career saw him shift from pro-democracy campaigner to a Russia-friendly figure lauded<\/a> by the US Maga movement \u2013 will not sit in parliament. Late last month Orb\u00e1n, 62, said he would instead focus<\/a> on the reorganisation of his movement.<\/p>\n Magyar, 45, has vowed to use his large majority to undo the systems built by Orb\u00e1n, who had stacked the country\u2019s judiciary, media and state with loyalists as he sought to turn Hungary into a \u201cpetri dish for illiberalism\u201d.<\/p>\n Beyond the country\u2019s borders, Magyar has also vowed to rebuild Hungary\u2019s long-strained relationship with the EU and work with the bloc to unlock billions in frozen EU funds.<\/p>\n Hints of this change were symbolically laced through the plans for Saturday\u2019s swearing in: several anthems were to ring out, paying tribute to Hungary\u2019s EU membership, its sizeable Roma minority, and ethnic Hungarians in neighbouring countries, while the lawyer Vilmos K\u00e1tai-N\u00e9meth was to become the country\u2019s first visually impaired minister, taking on the portfolio of social and family affairs. More than a quarter of lawmakers will be women \u2013 a record high in the country\u2019s post-communist history.<\/p>\n \u00c1gnes Forsthoffer is sworn in as the speaker of parliament. Photograph: Attila Kisbenedek\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n It was an echo of the actions Magyar has taken in the weeks since the election, as he sought to emphasise the end of what he described as Hungary\u2019s \u201ctwo-decade-long nightmare\u201d; vowing to suspend<\/a> broadcasts from state media that functioned as Orb\u00e1n mouthpieces, calling<\/a> on Orb\u00e1n-era appointees to resign; meeting twice with EU officials, and sending back<\/a> the millions of Hungarian forints donated to him by an Orb\u00e1n-linked supporter.<\/p>\n The task Magyar and his government face is huge. His promises to fix the country\u2019s crumbling public services will come up against the country\u2019s stagnating economy and a stubbornly high<\/a> budget deficit. Meanwhile, it remains to be seen how the many Orb\u00e1n loyalists in media, academia and the judiciary will react to change.<\/p>\n Even so, the mood on Saturday was celebratory in Budapest. At a Tisza booth, crowds lined up to buy party swag, while others milled around waving Hungarian flags.<\/p>\n Crowd gathered outside the Hungarian parliament building. Photograph: Leonhard F\u00f6ger\/Reuters<\/p>\n Even as left of centre and liberal parties are set to be absent from parliament for the first time since 1990, Budapest\u2019s liberal mayor was swift to call on Hungarians to come together to mark the end of Fidesz\u2019s grip on power and hail those who had long stood up<\/a> to the system.<\/p>\n