Socialist Congress To Elect New Leaders On July 19

Budapest, May 31 (MTI) – The national board of the opposition Socialist Party has convened a congress to renew the party’s leadership on July 19, head of the board Laszlo Botka announced today.

The party will be steered by its national election committee, led by Botka, in the meantime.

On the sidelines of a board meeting held behind closed doors, Botka said that nominees for the new leadership will be required to have a programme on modernising the party and increasing its competitiveness.

The board voted support for the election committee’s nine members, and adopted a schedule under which local Socialist chapters will elect their own leaders as well as delegates to the national congress between June 1 and 30. Candidates running for national positions will be required to collect signatures in support from 10 percent of the membership of their local chapters.

The next six weeks are expected to mobilise not only the Socialist Party but the whole of Hungary’s Left, Botka said, adding that “we will now stop analysing the causes which led to our (election) defeat but work to rebuild the party”.

Botka declined to answer questions whether he was planning to run for the Socialist chair.