The new ‘Watermelon Party’ of Hungary: opinion

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Hungarian political blogger Ödön B. Nagy takes a closer and somewhat sarcastic look at the union of two leftist political movements: “Yes” and Solidarity.

(Editor’s note: “Yes” is a new political platform launched last December by former prominent Socialist Party politician Tibor Szanyi, who was both MEP and vice-president of the Socialist Party at various times.)

We should mark Jan. 13 in the calendar as the day when the flame of a new hope flared up in the heart of the Hungarian nation: the fusion of love between Yes and Solidarity.

Hungary’s Solidarity has no less than one somewhat prominent figure and is incidentally also the father of the not-quite-original idea of hijacking Polish Solidarity’s name (thereby also dragging that party into the mud).

The other political movement, Yes, may not be generally known to the population, but should its founder, Tibor Szanyi, keep up his ubiquitous media presence it may well be in the future.

Szanyi is also one who happens to speak unassailable truths, such as that “not even dissolution can save the Socialist Party”. His words are statistically quite accurate, given how there have been very few – maybe zero – cases in which dissolution worked to the advantage of any party in history.

That the dissolution of the Socialist Party could, on the other hand, be beneficial to the country as a whole is quite another matter.

The Yes movement will be similar to other green movements inasmuch as it will follow the classic configuration of green on the outside and red on the inside.

Szanyi’s brainchild, however, is quite open in this respect, with him saying, “The green shell of the watermelon is in organic unity with its red interior. One presupposes the existence of the other. We must also note that it has seeds, meaning that it is capable of reproduction.”

Yet another great truth uttered by Szanyi.

The fusion of these two great movements will bring about long-needed changes in Hungarian and European politics. Or not.


Title image: Former Socialist politician Tibor Szanyi, founder of the “Yes” movement (source: Origo/István Bielik)

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