Politics

Note: As I write this I'm sitting in the teacher's lounge nibbling on a pepper and bacon pogacsa (poh-GAT-chuh) and drinking espresso (I already miss large cups of Amerakai Kave - everything here is espresso and the size of a shot glass).

Sunday was election day in Hungary and the Magyars selected their Prime Minister for the next four years. Gyurcsany Ferenc of MSZP (M-S-P; a party that has historical ties to the former communist regime but now is more liberal than their chief rival) was elected by the slimmest of margins to a second term. Voters here do not directly select the PM candidate, but rather vote for a party which then nominates their candidates (similar in ways to our system of delegates). MSZP's fiercest competition is from Fidesz ("FEE-dez" The conservative rival to MSZP, they have been joined by Hungary's more right-wing Christians, not unlike the Republican Party in America). In addition, two smaller parties earned enough votes to be represented in the Parliament. Those parties, Szdsz (S-D-S) and MDF, each barely earned 5%, the threshold necessary for representation in Budapest.

During my first week here I've seen countless advertisements on TV and plastered on billboards, street poles and the sides of buildings making me familiar with the different parties and the faces of their candidates. Many of the signs simply read "Igen, MSZP!" or "Igen, Fidesz!" (Yes, Fidesz!) Perhaps if you click this picture you can make out the orange and red advertisements hanging from the streetlights.

Wednesday and Thursday night's debates between the candidates were televised throughout the country, and Sunday night I sat with Chad and Julia watching the election returns (Julia interpreted the important comments).

Like in the United States, there is strong partisanship and depending who you talk to, you will get a different story about the parties and their candidates. Gyurcsany Ference is a very wealthy man, and when I asked a teacher at Varga how he got his money, she told me that I had asked "a vary good question." She said much of his money was made during the breakup of communist Hungary when public property was being sold off to private interests. It turns out, this woman is a supporter of Fidesz, Gyurcsany's opponent. Later, when I asked Julia about his money, she told me he is a very intelligent man who has a good business sense. She supports Szdsz, the smaller "third party" that is affilliated with Gyurcsany's MSZP Party. When I told her of what the teacher had earlier shared with me, she scoffed at the explanation and dismissed it as partisanship.

Finally, the country is divided into a couple hundred districts, from which there is one representative in Parliament. There are another 180 or so seats that are floating, and not assigned to a geographic region. The parties that earn 5% of the overall national vote are entitled to a share of these seats. Any district in which no candidate earned 50% of the vote, there will be a second round of voting in two weeks. If the outcome of those elections is radically different from Sunday's voting, the Prime Minister could change, but it's not likely.

I'm very interested to know if on the national news in the US or on the new networks there is any mention at all of the Hungarian national elections. I doubt it.