The main opposition Fidesz party and its election ally Christian Democrats decided to move their campaign-opening rally on the national holiday of March 15 to a new site, a senior Fidesz official told MTI on Wednesday.
Fidesz originally planned to hold the rally by the foot of Elisabeth Bridge, on the Pest side of the Danube, near the Astoria junction.
The party decided to move the rally, expectedly attracting tens of thousands, because two other parties, the ruling Socialists and radical nationalist Jobbik, would hold rallies not far from the originally planned site of the Fidesz event, Peter Szijjarto, head of party leader Viktor Orban’s office, said.
Fidesz now will hold the rally in the afternoon at a square with the statue of Dozsa Gyorgy behind Buda Castle and on the main street running in front of it, he said, adding that the decision was made “to avoid any disturbance to the peace and safety of participants.” He made reference to an incident on October 23, 2006, involving clashes between rowdy groups of demonstrators and police in the city centre, close to the site of a peaceful Fidesz rally.
The Socialists announced to meet by Pilvax Cafe, just a few blocks away from the originally planned Fidesz event. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday the party’s spokeswoman noted that the Socialists had come first to announce the site of their campaign event, ahead of Fidesz.
The Jobbik party’s gathering is planned on Deak Square, also in the city centre and not far from the Socialists’ event.
All three rallies are set to begin at 3 pm.
MSZP should have no problem with handling the few hundred party faithful attending their event. It is funny to see these old, broken down Communists pretending that they care about Hungary and her history. They probably get a speech about “democratic values” whatever that means in Communist lingo. Their number will be over inflated by their press.
Fidesz was smart to move to a new location but it may not help them much. MSZP has its agent provocateurs who will probably disrupt their meeting and set a few garbage containers on fire. One would assume that even slow learning Fidesz learned some crowd control and will try to keep the MSZP provocateurs away. We will soon see.
Jobbik meeting are always well organized and peaceful. Provocateurs are handled by the Magyar Garda as always. No problems expected. Even the MSZP agent provocateurs know that it is not smart to start something with Jobbik events. There is good reason to believe that Jobbik will have the largest number of people attending and unlike the MSZP people, they know who and what it is they are commemorating. As always, their attendance numbers will be greatly underreported in the press. There should be no TV or press coverage of Jobbik event unless the MSZP agent provocateurs manage to cause some disturbance.
HirTV and EchoTV (these are for Fidesz) reporters are forbidden to say anything about Jobbik. The other stations are in MSZP hands and they do not need to be told not to report anything positive about Jobbik. They know that Lendvai and Company owns them until election. After election, the same people will follow Orban’s wishes, assuming that Jobbik does not pull a huge surprise.
The sad part is that the Communists managed to transfer their rule of terror into political force after the gengszterváltás. Other post-Communist countries banned the Communist from public life. Their decision shows in higher living standards in those countries.
One would assume that even slow learning Fidesz learned some crowd control and will try to keep the MSZP provocateurs away
BIG JIM at March 4, 2010 4:12 PM
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The Budapest Police told Fidesz before the 23rd of October, 2006, to move their meeting from outside Astoria, but Fidesz refused
The Deak Square was the gathering place in 2006 for the rioters and the Police tried to keep them in control there but failed, then there are too many ways to come from there (the Metro is just one and why stop all trains in Budapest for a few 100 well organised thugs?)
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Obviously Fidesz want to distance themselves very much from Jobbik, so they even go over water for that
The question is how Fidesz will handle the normal provocations from their right-fringe, so far they have let them have their time with Arpad-flags etc
We should not forget how Pav see Fidesz as a party led by Jews and Roma, and how Jobbik officially calls Fidesz for ‘Szidesz’ a play of words with ‘Zsido’, Jew in Hungarian
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Most of the leadership of the most violent right-wing extremists are probably locked up at the moment and Jobbik seems to play it safe now, so no real riots before 22 should be expected
After 22 there will probably be some isolated attacks on NNI’s HQ (Hungarian FBI) and maybe a few Molotov-cocktails thrown at MSZP-offices
The people behind these attacks are the next in row of the Budahazy support groups and Magyar Garda have had ample time to change clothes and drink a few beer with the other hooligans