Opening his speech, Prime Minister Orbán asked voters to support Fidesz candidate Gábor Erőss, arguing that stable government requires loyal and reliable parliamentary representatives. But the prime minister said he had also come to Esztergom to speak about the wider stakes of the election, which he described as exceptionally serious.
PM Orbán said Hungary has been under pressure for months from several directions. “They are threatening us from everywhere,” he said, referring to the Tisza Party, Ukraine, and Brussels. According to the prime minister, these forces all want the same outcome: a change of government that would end Hungary’s national course and install a leadership more aligned with external interests.
Prime Minister Orbán argued that the central issue behind the Ukrainian-Hungarian conflict is money. He said Ukraine has no money, while Western Europe has also exhausted its own resources after sending financial support eastward. As a result, he said, Brussels wants to finance Ukraine through massive loans backed by the member states.
According to PM Orbán, this is where the real danger lies for Hungary. He said the European Union would take on debt from banks, pass that money on to Ukraine, and then leave member states to bear the burden when repayment fails to materialize. The prime minister pointed to the proposed €90 billion package and to further plans involving hundreds of billions more, warning that these liabilities would fall on European taxpayers for years to come.
“If we choose a pro-Ukrainian government, Hungarians’ money will also go to Ukraine,” Prime Minister Orbán said. He added that not only today’s taxpayers, but even “our children and grandchildren,” would be left repaying what he called Brussels’ war loans. “We cannot allow this,” the prime minister made clear.
PM Orbán argued that only a national government can resist both war and what he described as the looting of the country. He said Hungary has already shown that it can stay out of the conflict, noting that the government’s most important pledge in 2022 was to keep the country out of the war, and that this commitment had been fulfilled.
Alongside this, Prime Minister Orbán pointed to the government’s domestic record even in the shadow of war: an 11 percent rise in the minimum wage, a housing scheme that he said gives Hungarian young people the easiest access in Europe to a first home, the restoration of the 13th-month and 14th-month pension, and the rollout of family support measures including lifelong tax exemption for mothers with at least two children.
Turning back to the campaign, PM Orbán said this is not a time for experimentation. In a dangerous international environment, he argued, Hungary needs experience, calm judgment, and a government capable of saying no both to war and to financial arrangements that would harm the country.
In closing, Prime Minister Orbán urged supporters to speak to their families, neighbors, and colleagues about what is at stake. If Hungary keeps a national government, he said, the country will remain safe. If it chooses a pro-Ukrainian one, it risks losing what it has built over the past sixteen years.