The attempt to oust Viktor Orbán is falling apart

This week it was confirmed that a Hungarian general election – framed as a referendum on Viktor Orbán’s leadership – will take place on April 3. As the campaigning descends into acrimony and with cracks appearing in the previously smooth facade of the country’s United Opposition, Orbán – the Fidesz leader and scourge of Brussels bureaucrats – is gaining ground.

When a group of six opposition parties banded together to elect the conservative small-town mayor Péter Márki-Zay as their joint prime ministerial candidate in October to take on Orbán, the race was neck-and-neck. But Orbán has since managed to prosper by using ‘divide and conquer’ campaign tactics highlighting the ideological divisions and personal grievances of the opposition. Polls now suggest that Fidesz is pulling ahead; the latest forecasts have Orbán’s party on 49 per cent, ahead of the United Opposition on 45 per cent.

Márki-Zay has come in for criticism from his own partners after the wave of optimism following his appointment as opposition leader subsided.