By: V4 Agency
A fitting description of Hungarian Jobbik Party President Peter Jakab, whose popularity plummeted in the first elimination round of the left-wing “primaries” is: a politician who cannot be taken seriously and has made a laughing stock of himself, which is clearly reflected in his poll numbers. The question arises as to whether Ferenc Gyurcsany single-handedly cheated Peter Jakab and the voters of Jobbik, or whether the voter deception was a product of a Gyurcsany-Jakab pact?
Hungarian Jobbik party President Peter Jakab, who is known for his anti-Semitic and racist scandals, has seemed particularly confident in recent months as a contender in the prime ministerial primaries of the opposition parties. He regularly proclaimed in his parliamentary speeches that he was one of the people, who represents the majority of Hungarians, political scientist Daniel Deak, senior analyst of the Hungarian 21st Century Institute told V4NA. Mr Deak added that Jakab’s confidence was also on display when he verbally threatened Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban with imprisonment from a stance of practical certainty that he would become the new prime minister with a change of government.
“It seems, however, that Peter Jakab is a victim of deception,” as Ferenc Gyurcsany, failed former prime minister and president of the largest leftist-liberal party, has long wanted to get rid of him, the pundit remarked. To that end, Mr Gyurcsany first struck a deal with Jobbik, and then “proposed a strategy for the party president to follow, amounting to Jakab making a fool of himself.”
Mr Jakab’s role in this leftist-liberal hodgepodge rainbow coalition was to be loud and obnoxious. Accordingly, he has voiced numerous outrageous statements, putting himself at the focal point of many scandals. Although this brought him likes on social media, it also made him look unserious. This is evident from his lack of support, as he did not make it into the second round of the left-wing primaries show.
Political scientist Daniel Deak, senior analyst of the 21st Century Institute
Daniel Deak said Jakab not only destroyed Jobbik, but also himself by surrendering to Ferenc Gyurcsany, who rules the Hungarian political left.
“In addition to giving up Jobbik’s identity and teaming up with Ferenc Gyurcsany, the very person against whom Jobbik had originally been formed, Jakab eroded his political capital, as he could not break through to a significant portion of opposition voters with the role that Ferenc Gyurcsany prescribed for him,” the political scientist pointed out. He added “Peter Jakab’s clout will have completely disintegrated after the recent bad result”, as it is visible that Jobbik’s voters are actually far fewer in number than polls had earlier indicated.
Jobbik has been steadily losing support in recent years, after being embroiled in a series of scandals and then joining forces with left-wing parties and ousted Hungarian PM Ferenc Gyurcsany. Recent events show that Peter Jakab has completely vacated his party of substance for good.
In recent weeks, Mr Jakab himself has been caught up in a number of scandals, which have also done much damage to his image. As V4NA reported earlier, the organisers of Budapest Pride considered his homophobic joke unacceptable and the inappropriate remark also raised some eyebrows in Brussels.
“It is unacceptable that a politician – to whom the LGBTQ community is nothing but the punchline of a joke – would seek legitimacy to lead the country,” the organisers of Budapest Pride wrote on social media, in response to a speech delivered by Peter Jakab.
According to Budapest Pride, the words of Peter Jakab suggest that it’s mock-worthy if someone happens to be gay. Besides cracking a “gay joke” in parliament, Mr Jakab went one step further by joking about sexual violence.
Sources of V4NA say the tasteless remark has raised some eyebrows even in Brussels, and many think that it’s proof that Jobbik, a party embroiled in many anti-Semitic and homophobic scandals, has not changed. It simply presents itself and its current leader in a people’s party disguise in a bid to grab power.
The events of the past few days have shown that the Hungarian electorate is not interested in the scandal-politics of Mr Jakab; the ousted PM, Ferenc Gyurcsany has achieved his goal by tricking Mr Jakab and the voters of the Jobbik party.
“Everything in this charade turned out as Ferenc Gyurcsany had planned,”the group leader of the Hungarian ruling party Fidesz wrote on social media, assessing the results of the first round of the vote-out show. Mate Kocsis pointed out that Gyurcsany “crushed the Momentum [party], the LMP [party] and destroyed the Jobbik [party]. The MSZP [party] he killed long ago.” As Mr Kocsis said, “it is also blatantly obvious that on the left there is no new impetus, no new faces, no closure of the past, no different politics because the feeble attempt at renewing the left has failed miserably. (Of course, it was doomed to fail from the start, but its participants did not notice for lack of political competence.)”
He emphasized that on the left Ferenc Gyurcsany is the sole leader, and under his leadership figures of the disastrous past are returning to the left for the next decade.
The group leader thinks that Gyurcsany “has overpowered everyone, disbanding the small ones [parties], just as we had predicted. In fact, ha has only left two possibilities open: either his wife will be his choice candidate for prime minister or his puppet currently running the capital [Budapest mayor], who had already been on his payroll 17 years ago, and has been slavishly executing his will ever since.”
“So let the charade on the left go on, but there will surely be only one laughing in the end: Ferenc Gyurcsany,” Mr Kocsis concluded.