MSZP proclaims renewal
December 16th, 2014Commenting on the National Conference of the Socialist Party, both Magyar Nemzet and Népszabadság believe that the MSZP has a long way to go before it can become a decisive factor in shaping Hungary’s future, as its leaders pledged last Saturday.
In Magyar Nemzet, Mariann Katona thinks that the MSZP doesn’t know how it could overcome its own insignificance. She admits that recent demonstrations, including the last one in Budapest on Sunday express significant public animosity around a series of measures taken by the government, but protesters have acted outside the opposition parties, including the MSZP. Similarly, the Socialists have not been able to profit from Fidesz’s diminishing popularity. The pro-government commentator quotes Socialist Party leader József Tóbiás who told Saturday’s party conference that he would follow new policies, but remarks that he did not clearly elaborate on what these would consist in. “Perhaps he doesn’t know himself”, Katona concludes.
Népszabadság welcomes that before re-building itself, the MSZP wants to “build ideas”. It was decided, in fact, that a three member committee, including former European Commissioner László Andor will elaborate the new, explicitly left-wing line the MSZP will follow in the future, in contrast to the “neoliberal” policies that characterized the left over the past 25 years. This means however, Népszabadság notes in its front page editorial, that the Socialist Party is just embarking on a long journey that should lead it to represent outrage over the plight of the poor “in a spontaneous and impetuous way”.