Hungarian parliamentary election, 2006

Last updated
Hungarian parliamentary election, 2006
Flag of Hungary.svg
  2002 9 and 23 April 2006 2010  

All 386 seats to the Országgyűlés
194 seats were needed for a majority

 First partySecond party
  Ferenc Gyurcsany, Davos 2 (cropped).jpg Orban Viktor Portrait.jpg
Leader Ferenc Gyurcsány Viktor Orbán
Party MSZP Fidesz–KDNP
Leader since24 February 200717 May 2003
Last election178 seats, 42.05%179 seats (as part of Fidesz-MDF)
Seats won
Seat changeIncrease2.svg 13Decrease2.svg 15
Popular vote2,336,7052,272,979
Percentage43.21%42.03%
SwingIncrease2.svg 1.16%Increase2.svg 0.96%

 Third partyFourth party
  GaborKuncze.jpg David Ibolya (2).jpg
Leader Gábor Kuncze Ibolya Dávid
Party SZDSZ MDF
Leader sinceJune 200130 January 1999
Last election19 seats, 5.57%9 seats (as part of Fidesz-MDF)
Seats won
Seat changeDecrease2.svg 1Increase2.svg 2
Popular vote351,612272,831
Percentage6.50%5.04%
SwingIncrease2.svg 0.93%

SMC2006.png
Map showing winning or leading parties in each single-member constituency

PM before election

Ferenc Gyurcsány
MSZP

Elected PM

Ferenc Gyurcsány
MSZP

Coat of Arms of Hungary.svg
This article is part of a series on the
politics and government of
Hungary
Foreign relations

Parliamentary elections were held in Hungary on 9 April 2006, with a second round of voting in 110 of the 176 single-member constituencies on 23 April. [1] [2] The Hungarian Socialist Party emerged as the largest party in the National Assembly with 186 of the 386 seats, and continued the coalition government with the Alliance of Free Democrats. It marked the first time a government had been re-elected since the end of Communist rule. [3]

Hungary Country in Central Europe

Hungary is a country in Central Europe. Spanning 93,030 square kilometres (35,920 sq mi) in the Carpathian Basin, it borders Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Austria to the northwest, Romania to the east, Serbia to the south, Croatia to the southwest, and Slovenia to the west. With about 10 million inhabitants, Hungary is a medium-sized member state of the European Union. The official language is Hungarian, which is the most widely spoken Uralic language in the world. Hungary's capital and largest city is Budapest. Other major urban areas include Debrecen, Szeged, Miskolc, Pécs and Győr.

Hungarian Socialist Party political party in Hungary

The Hungarian Socialist Party, known mostly by its acronym MSZP, is a social-democratic political party in Hungary.

The Alliance of Free Democrats – Hungarian Liberal Party was a liberal political party in Hungary.

Contents

Electoral system

The unicameral, 386-member National Assembly (Országgyűlés), the highest organ of state authority, initiates and approves legislation sponsored by the prime minister. A party had to win at least 5% of the national vote to form a parliamentary faction. The National Assembly had 386 members, elected for a four year term: 176 members in single-seat constituencies, 152 by proportional representation in multi-seat constituencies (using territorial lists) and 58 members (using a national list) to realize proportional representation.

The election took over two days. On 9 April elections took place in every constituency, both single-seat and multi-seat. In order to get elected into a single-seat constituency, a candidate needs to receive more than 50% of the vote; in the 2006 elections, the victor received more than 50% of the vote in 66 of the 176 single-seat constituencies. There will be another election in the remaining 110 single-seat constituencies in the 2nd round, in which all but the top three candidates (and every candidate reaching 15%) from the 1st round are excluded. Usually parties form alliances between the two rounds and withdraw many of their 3rd place candidates and call for supporting the allied party so the winning candidate of the 2nd round will receive more than 50% of the vote. However, this process is not automatic; it is grounded by negotiations.

The multi-seat elections also took place during the first round of voting. 146 of the 152 seats were filled using proportional representation. The remaining 6 were added to the national list. The country was divided into 20 regions for the multi-seat elections with varying numbers of members per region. Where a party won more members in a regional than it merited, the surplus votes were deducted from the total it received in the second round. Correspondingly, a party that received fewer seats than it merited had the shortfall votes added to its total in the second round.

A further 58 (plus 6 more not elected from the single-seat constituencies in the first round) extra members were elected using a national list in order to achieve a more proportional result.

Before the election the parties needed to be registered by the National Electoral Office. After registration the parties had the right to collect references. Each candidate had to collect 750 references in their district. If one party collected the required number in two districts (in Budapest 8, Pest 5 and Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén 3) in a county, then it could present a list in regional constituencies. If a party had at least seven regional lists, it could present a national compensation list. 17 March was the last day when a party could be registered and a list or a candidate could be registered. By 28 February, 49 parties had sought registration, and 45 were registered by the National Electoral Office.

Budapest Capital city in Hungary

Budapest is the capital and the most populous city of Hungary, and the tenth-largest city in the European Union by population within city limits. The city had an estimated population of 1,752,704 in 2016 distributed over a land area of about 525 square kilometres. Budapest is both a city and county, and forms the centre of the Budapest metropolitan area, which has an area of 7,626 square kilometres and a population of 3,303,786, comprising 33 percent of the population of Hungary.

Campaign

On 10 April the two parties of the governing coalition (Hungarian Socialist Party and Alliance of Free Democrats) announced their alliance for the second round. The Socialist Party withdrew three of their candidates in favour of the Alliance one, and the Alliance withdrew their remaining 55 candidates (all of which had finished third), and called on its voters to support the Socialists. The leaders of the two parties ran a common campaign between the two rounds.

The opposition was not united. The Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) which hit the 5% threshold contrary to the polls and expectations made it clear that they would not support Viktor Orbán's Fidesz party. Orbán tried to get their support by declaring that he resigned from Prime Minister candidacy, and sought a compromise candidate, Péter Ákos Bod, but the MDF held to their independency; thus they did not withdraw their 3rd place candidates. However, some MDF candidates did not agree with this, and withdrew in favour of Fidesz.

Hungarian Democratic Forum political party

The Hungarian Democratic Forum was a centre-right political party in Hungary. It had a Hungarian nationalist, national-conservative and christian democratic ideology. The party was represented continuously in the National Assembly from the restoration of democracy in 1990 until 2010. It was dissolved on 8 April 2011.

Viktor Orbán Hungarian politician, chairman of Fidesz

Viktor Mihály Orbán is a Hungarian politician serving as Prime Minister of Hungary since 2010. He also served as Prime Minister from 1998 to 2002. He is the present leader of the national conservative Fidesz party, a post he has held since 2003 and, previously, from 1993 to 2000.

Fidesz Hungarian political party

Fidesz – Hungarian Civic Alliance is a national-conservative, right-wing populist political party in Hungary.

Polls

PartyJanuary+/-February+/-March
Fidesz – Hungarian Civic Union 48%-6.3%41.7%+2.5%44.2%
Hungarian Socialist Party 42%+0.1%42.1%+2.6%44.7%
Alliance of Free Democrats 3%+2.8%5.8%-1.2%4.6%
Hungarian Democratic Forum 3%+1.4%4.4%-0.7%3.7%
Centre Party 2%+0.8%2.8%-2.2%0.6%
Hungarian Communist Workers' Party 1%-0.2%0.8%-0.4%0.4%
Hungarian Justice and Life PartyJobbik (Movement for a Better Hungary) the Third Way1%+0.6%1.6%-0.2%1.4%
Others0%+0.8%0.8%-0.4%0.4%
Source: Gallup

Results

Hungarian parliamentary election, 2006.svg
PartySMCsMMCsNational
seats
Total
seats
+/–
Votes%SeatsVotes%Seats
Fidesz-MPSZ-KDNP Fidesz-MPSZ 2,269,24142.0682,272,97942.06927141–23
KDNP 23+23
Hungarian Socialist Party 2,175,31240.3982,336,70543.27117186+8
Alliance of Free Democrats 340,7466.33351,6126.541118–1
Hungarian Democratic Forum 238,5664.40272,8315.02911+11
MSZP-SZDSZ 154,6192.9606
MIÉP–Jobbik Third Way Alliance of Parties 92,7981.70119,0072.20000
Fidesz-MPSZ-KDNP-MDF 34,1090.6000
Hungarian Communist Workers' Party 16,3790.3021,9550.40000
Centre Party 14,1260.3017,4310.30000
MDF-Solidarity for Szabolcs County13,6720.3000
Association for Somogy 9,4570.2101New
Forum of Gipsy Organisations in Hungary-Party of Roma Solidarity7,1650.104,4590.1000New
Party of Greens 4,6780.102,8700.1000New
Christian Democratic Party - Solidarity of Christian Social Centre2,9060.102,3620.1000New
Hungarian Countryside and Civic Party2,7160.002,7890.1000New
Independent Smallholders Party 2,0300.008380.00000
Human Chain for Hungary 2,0020.0000New
Workers' Party of Hungary 2006 1,4890.005560.0000New
Hungarian Pensioners Party-MDF 1,1660.0000
Alliance of Hungarians for One Another9040.007670.0000New
Party of Independent Smallholders and National Unity7420.008890.0000New
Hungarian Pensioners Party5050.00000
Social Democratic Party 1180.00000
Alliance of Green Democrats 950.0000New
Létalap800.0000New
Independents18,0540.3000
Invalid/blank votes51,40247,302
Total5,455,0771001765,455,352100140703860
Registered voters/turnout8,046,12967.88,046,12967.8
Source: Nohlen & Stöver

See also

2006 protests in Hungary protest

The 2006 protests in Hungary were a series of anti-government protests triggered by the release of Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány's private speech in which he confessed that his Hungarian Socialist Party had lied to win the 2006 election, and had done nothing worth mentioning in the previous four years of governing. Most of the events took place in Budapest and other major cities between 17 September and 23 October. It was the first sustained protest in Hungary since 1989.

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References

  1. Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) Elections in Europe: A data handbook, p 900 ISBN   978-3-8329-5609-7
  2. Nohlen & Stöver, p 928
  3. Hungary Socialists win new term BBC News, 26 April 2006