The chances of the candidates of the governing Fidesz-Christian Democratic alliance are good to finish the autumn municipal election with good results in almost all constituencies, analysts told MTI on Thursday, after the president set October 3 as the date of the elections earlier in the day.
Setting the date for the earliest possible day could benefit mostly the ruling party alliance, since it is in the government’s interest to have the balloting take place months ahead of the parliamentary debate on next year’s budget, said Gabor Filippov of Progressive Institute.
Filippov expects a fierce fight in towns and villages that saw close results during the April general elections or are currently governed by the opposition.
Orsolya Szomszed of conservative Nezopont Institute agreed in seeing good chances for Fidesz-KDNP for winning the local elections. Support for Fidesz has practically not changed since the spring elections, she said, noting that the party has maintained its significant lead over the Socialist party.Time has been too short to improve the Socialists’ situation since the recent election of the party board and ranks, she added.
Filippov said most interesting would be the vote for the mayor of Budapest. Fidesz is likely to win, which will break a trend of several decades, he added.
“During the course of the past hundred years, Budapest has been a stronghold of liberal, left-wing progress,” said Filippov.
