Hungarian parliament votes to remove president and purge judiciary
Hungary's new government has used its supermajority to remove the president and senior judges, accelerating the dismantling of an authoritarian state apparatus but risking a constitutional crisis.
The Hungarian parliament has voted to remove President Tamás Sulyok from office, alongside the head of the Constitutional Court, Péter Polt. Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s Tisza party used its 141 deputies and two-thirds majority to pass the 17th constitutional amendment, drawing a standing ovation. The vote marked the most dramatic day in parliament since the new government took office in early May.
Sulyok now has five days to sign the amendment or refer it to the Constitutional Court. If he chooses the latter, Magyar has warned he will launch impeachment proceedings that would automatically suspend the president from office. The government has urged Sulyok to resign to avoid a constitutional crisis.
The 17th amendment is a sweeping package intended to govern Hungary until a new constitution is adopted in two to three years. It grants the government the power to dismiss any public official with immediate effect, a dramatic shift in the legal framework governing the state. The legislation also forcibly removes Constitutional Court judges over the age of 70.
The speed of the overhaul highlights the immense difficulty of unwinding a system built to withstand electoral defeat. "And it is now very difficult to break up a sophisticated authoritarian regime... which was designed to survive even after electoral defeat," said András Baka, the former head of the Supreme Court.
Deputies from the opposition Fidesz party walked out before the vote, accusing Tisza of building a tyranny. Fidesz governed Hungary for 16 years until its surprise defeat on April 12, using its own supermajority to write a 2011 constitution based on the principle that the winner takes all. "The great irony of the situation is that Fidesz have fallen foul of their own concept of power," said Péter Rona, a former opposition presidential candidate.
The amendment also forbids deputies who have served three terms from standing again, a measure that applies to more than half of the current Fidesz deputies. Baka, who agrees with removing the president, argued that this specific provision is flawed. "This limits the right of the public to vote for whom they wish," he said.
The vote occurred as Fidesz grapples with internal disarray following its landslide loss. Former prime minister Viktor Orbán has hardly appeared in public, refused to take his parliamentary seat, and travelled to the United States for the football World Cup finals. On Monday, Gergely Gulyás, the party's number two, resigned as head of its parliamentary group.
