BUDAPEST: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s nationalist party appeared set to take the most votes in Sunday’s European Parliament elections, a race that pitted the long-serving leader against a new challenger that has upended Orbán’s grip on Hungarian politics in recent months.

With 55 percent of votes counted, Orbán’s Fidesz party had 43 percent of the vote, enough to send 11 delegates of Hungary’s 21 total seats in the European Union’s legislature.
While Fidesz took a plurality of votes, it was down sharply from 52 percent support in 2019 EU elections and looked set to lose two seats in what was widely seen as a referendum on Orbán’s popularity.
Preliminary results showed that more than 56 percent of eligible voters cast a ballot, setting a record for participation in an EU election in Hungary.
While Fidesz has dominated Hungarian politics since 2010, many are deeply dissatisfied with how it has governed the country. A deep economic crisis and a recent series of scandals involving Fidesz politicians have rocked the party which prides itself on upholding family values and Christian conservatism.
Those factors led to the emergence of one of the most formidable challengers Orbán has ever faced, Péter Magyar, who broke ranks with Orbán’s party in February and in a matter of months built up Hungary’s strongest opposition party.
That party, Respect and Freedom (TISZA), stood at 31 percent of the vote Sunday, amounting to seven delegates to the European Parliament.

Magyar gathered a crowd of supporters next to the Danube River in Budapest on Sunday evening to await results. As strong storms approached the city, he addressed the crowd and encouraged them to take cover until the storm passed.
But he struck an optimistic tone concerning the election results, casting the day as a turning point in Hungarian politics, which have centered around Orbán for more than 14 years.
“Althought we don’t know the results yet,” he said, “today is a milestone. I would like to ask everyone to remember this day well. On June 9, 2024, an era has come to an end.”
Magyar has planned to use the elections to propel himself and his movement to challenge and defeat Orbán in the next national ballot scheduled for 2026. The 43-year-old lawyer’s accusations of widespread corruption in Orbán’s government, and claims that Fidesz has used a “propaganda machine” to sow deep social divisions, have resonated with many Hungarians who desire change.
On the eve of the election, he mobilized tens of thousands of demonstrators in Budapest in a final appeal for support for his new party.
While the favorable result for TISZA portended a shift in Hungary’s domestic politics, right-wing populists like Orbán made significant gains across Europe in the election, stirring fears that the world’s biggest trading bloc’s ability to make decisions could be undermined as war rages in Ukraine and anti-migrant sentiment mounts.
Hungary’s far-right Our Homeland party gained 6 percent of the vote Sunday, sending a delegate to Brussels for the first time.
Orbán, the Kremlin’s closest EU ally, had expressed hopes that parties across Europe that oppose providing military support to Ukraine would gain a majority in the EU legislature.
Hungary is set to take over the EU’s rotating six-month presidency in July.
The five-time prime minister cast the elections as a contest that would decide whether Russia’s war in Ukraine would engulf Europe. He campaigned heavily on fears that the war could escalate to involve Hungary directly if his political opponents were successful.
He has blamed “pro-war” politicians in Washington and Brussels for increasing tensions with Russia and portrayed his refusal to supply Kyiv with military aid and other support as a “pro-peace” position unique in Europe.
After casting his vote earlier in the day, Antal Zámbó, a 75-year-old retiree in Budapest, said he supported Orbán and Fidesz as he believed they would deliver “a more peaceful life.”
“Everyone benefits if there is peace in their surroundings as well as on the global stage,” he said.
A TISZA supporter, Gyula Német, 71, said governance by Orban’s party since 2010 has “not only proved that they are incompetent, but they totally divided this country.”
“Hungary has been pushed to the sidelines in Europe. We became totally segregated,” he said. “This cannot go on. We definitely need a positive change, integration with Europe and among the Hungarian people.”
 

BENI, Democratic Republic of Congo: The death toll has risen to 41 following an attack on Friday by suspected Islamist rebels on villages in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, a Congolese army spokesman said, bringing the total toll in the region to more than 80 since Tuesday.
Friday night’s attack, on the villages of Masala, Mapasana and Mahini, had been carried out by members of the Allied Democratic Forces (ADF), said lieutenant-colonel Mak Hazukay, an army spokesman in Congo’s North Kivu province.
The ADF, which is now based in eastern Congo, has pledged allegiance to Islamic State and mounts frequent attacks, further destabilising a region where many militant groups are active.
It originates from neighboring Uganda and is alleged to be behind multiple assaults in the area over the past week, including one in the village of Masawu that killed 17 people, two civil society leaders said.
On Thursday, five bodies were found in the villages of Kabweli and Mamulese, according to Justin Kavalami, a civil society member who helped search for bodies. The same day, six bodies were recovered from a river in the village of Mununze, that village’s chief said.
On Friday, 13 bodies were found in the village of Makobu, a civil society leader and the village chief said, bringing the total number of people killed by suspected ADF militants since Tuesday to 82.
It was not possible to reach the ADF for comment.

‘CHAOS’
During the attacks on Friday evening, armed men used guns and machetes to attack residents of the villages in Beni territory, local official Fabien Kakule told Reuters.
Vusindi Nick Junior, a local civil society leader, said a local health center had been set ablaze and nine people were injured in addition to the 41 killed.
“Several dozen civilians have been victims of the ADF in eastern DRC in recent days,” said EU foreign affairs spokeswoman Nabila Massrali, adding there was an urgent need to accelerate efforts to find a political solution.
“Terrorist groups are taking advantage of the chaos to expand their hold on an already very unstable region,” she said.
Julien Paluku, a former governor of North Kivu, said on X that Congo’s national government needed to do more to address insecurity in the east. The government has not yet made any statement on Friday’s attacks, and a government spokesman did not respond to requests for comment.
“People have the impression, rightly or wrongly, of being abandoned to their sad fate,” he said.