It is difficult to state with certainty why so many voters stayed away from the polls. Several factors were probably at play, in particular the opposition parties’ campaign to boycott the referendum, although their options were very limited. Another factor was certainly that the aggressive tone and extent of the government campaign had gone too far for many people. In addition, Hungarians seem to be tiring of the immigration issue. The government has been pushing this topic since early 2015, even though Hungary hasn’t been directly affected by immigration since the closure of its southern border. Instead of focusing on immigration, Hungarian voters would apparently prefer that the government address other pressing issues, such as employment, education, the health care system and corruption.
The bottom line is crucial: although the overwhelming majority of Hungarians expressed their opposition to refugee quotas in opinion surveys and despite the government’s massive campaign, which exceeded in its extent all previous political campaigns in Hungary and which cost more than both the Leave and Remain campaigns in the Brexit referendum combined, the Hungarian government failed to mobilise 50 percent of eligible voters. The number of “no” votes was scarcely more than the number of votes cast for Fidesz and the extreme right-wing Jobbik party in the 2014 parliamentary elections.
Although the composition of those who voted “no” is not known in detail, we can surmise that Orbán was unable to massively mobilise voters of the opposition parties for his purposes. At the same time, the government played up expectations too high, with Fidesz politicians stressing the importance of a valid referendum until two weeks before the vote.
No comments:
Post a Comment