April 25 (UPI) — Former Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban on Saturday said he will give up his seat in Parliament to focus on rebuilding his Fidesz-KDNP party after its election losses two weeks ago.
Orban said that he is leaving the parliament to focus on rebuilding the far-right, Russia-aligned party after it secured only 55 seats in Hungary’s parliament in elections on April 12, Politico and The New York Times reported.
Peter Magyar’s Tisza party won 138 of the parliament’s 199 seats in a landslide victory ending 16 years of Orban running the country.
“I am needed not in Parliament but in the organization of the patriotic movement,” Orban said in a video message posted on social media.
“Discussions are in full swing about renewing the patriotic camp, strengthening our parliamentary group and protecting our communities,” he said.
Magyar will take over as prime minister on May 9 and, because Tisza has more than two-thirds of the parliament’s seats, he can undue some of the actions Orban took during his rule, which included cracking down on the media and a host of democratic institutions.
Orban, who was in Hungary’s parliament since 1990 and prime minister since 2010, said he plans to remain in charge of Fidesz and will seek re-election in June to keep the job.
