Karácsony wins left-wing mayoral preselection

Párbeszéd’s Gergely Karácsony won the preselection vote to determine the left-wing opposition’s candidate for mayor of Budapest, defeating the Socialist Party’s Csaba Horváth.

A total of 34,133 valid votes were cast over the course of the week-long ballot, Péter Szigeti, the psephologist asked to oversee the vote and former head of the National Election Committee, told a press conference on Sunday.

Karácsony received 27,598 votes to Horváth’s 6,535, Szigeti said.

The preselection had been organised jointly by the Socialist Party, the Democratic Coalition (DK), Párbeszéd and the Solidarity Movement.

In his victory speech, Karácsony said that the goal was now to take Budapest back from ruling Fidesz’s “viceroys” and give it back to the residents.

“This day has no loser, except Fidesz,” he said. The mayor of Budapest’s 14th district said the capital had scored a “historic” victory against Fidesz’s “divisive politics”.

He said today was also the day when the opposition united with the people against the politics of Fidesz.

Karácsony said that starting on Monday, the opposition would use the power of the people against incumbent Budapest Mayor István Tarlós in an effort to change the city.

He said the message of the preselection vote was that Budapest’s residents were thinking outside the confines of political parties, and more in terms of common goals. Karácsony said he and all of his allies should keep in mind that they are not looking for the opposition’s mayoral candidate or offering an opposition election programme, but rather looking for the candidate of the people of Budapest and shaping their election programme to serve the people’s interests.