alone when Viktor Orbán dances the “peacock dance” – EU subsidies are fine but values ​​are not

The EU has a problem: Hungary.

Even last year, there were often two opposing sides in matters concerning common values: Poland and Hungary. Since the beginning of the Russian invasion, Poland has become closer to the rest of the EU and Hungary has been left alone.

Prime minister Viktor Orbán has led his country to a situation where it is a lone gambler.

Orbán’s balance from the last few weeks:

It is the nature of the EU that not everything suits all countries. But Hungary has set itself blatantly against the rest of the EU.

As the rest of the EU scuttled an austerity plan to cut Russian natural gas use, Orbán sent his foreign minister Péter Szijjártón To Moscow to beg Russia for more cheap gas.

A university lecturer who has studied Hungarian politics for a long time Heino Nyyssönen The University of Turku calls Orbán’s activities the term “peacock dance”, pávatánc in Hungarian.

It means the combination of rejection, consent and resistance in policy-making in a showy way, with tail feathers up.

– Orbán has undoubtedly succeeded several times in achieving his goals with provocative behavior and a very high profile, Nyyssönen says.

The background is popular, which is so solid that it is still not really understood in the rest of Europe.

In April, Orbán took a landslide victory in the country’s parliamentary elections and his fourth consecutive re-election. Hungary was full of Western election observers, but no particular fraud was detected.

However, Orbán has changed the country’s election system in such a way that the winner easily gets a generous majority of seats in the parliament. Now he has a majority of more than two-thirds, which means that the opposition does not really matter in the country.

Nyyssönen believes that Orbán’s self-confidence has grown even more with the landslide victory.

Orbán may be alone in the EU, but he has also expanded his influence. He can be seen and heard. His opinion must be taken into account.

Orbán has only one thing to really worry about right now.

The waves of war are hitting and inflation is raging. The exchange rate of the forint against the euro has plunged through Orbán’s reign in the 2010s and 2020s and has fallen to the alarming 400 mark in recent weeks.

Orbán is clinging to cheap Russian energy because it is a guarantee of his power.

– If Hungary had to give up Russian oil and gas, Orbán’s position would collapse. He has won several elections by justifying his election with cheap energy prices, Nyyssönen says.

Without EU money, Orbán’s government would have to undergo a severe diet.

And now the EU and Hungary are in an open dispute over subsidies. The EU Commission has frozen Hungary’s share of the corona stimulus subsidies, around six billion euros, and has also taken Hungary to the EU Court of Justice.

In particular, the EU is chafed by Hungary’s corruption, the gaps in the legal system, and the law passed by Orbán, which prevents talking about homosexuality in schools and in the media as “propaganda”.

As the chief negotiator of the European Parliament, a member of the coalition who followed the development of Hungary’s rule of law Petri Sarvamaa says it’s high time the EU held Orbá to account. Getting common money requires compliance with common principles.

– Hungary is on its own path. It completely knowingly violates common principles, and Orbán has no intention of playing the game on the same terms as other member states, says Sarvamaa.

When Orbán seems to be struggling in everything, Brussels has asked why Hungary wants to be a member of the EU in the first place.

Despite Orbán’s “peacock dance”, the EU exit, or Huxit, is still far away. Hungary is a historical part of Central Europe, and Hungarians are firmly on the side of EU membership. Orbán does not want to resign if the money flows even partially from Brussels to Budapest.

But what does the talk of last weekend cause?

Orbán is staunchly against immigration, but has previously avoided using the word race. Now 20 years as his advisor Zsuzsa Hegedüs resigned and compared the speech to the propaganda minister of Nazi Germany by Joseph Goebbels to rhetoric.

The confidence of the election winner seems to be rising.

The statements that breathe echoes of the 1930s guarantee Orbán an increasingly cold reception in Brussels, and do not facilitate the resolution of the money dispute.

While the rest of the EU is now on summer vacation, Orbán is heading to Texas. There, he speaks at the US conservative right-wing CPAC event, which is also attended by the ex-president of the US, who previously praised Orbán Donald Trump.

Orbán seems to have chosen his side. In the West, the closest ally is Trump, in the East, the Russian president who is waging a war of aggression Vladimir Putin.

The dance has produced quick wins, but on the EU road, Orbán is painting Hungary into a corner.

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