BUDAPEST, May 21 (Reuters) – Hungary’s ruling Tisza party submitted a constitutional amendment to parliament late on Wednesday that would allow prime ministers to serve for a maximum of eight years and would effectively bar former premier Viktor Orban from holding the role again.
Prime Minister Peter Magyar, who ousted nationalist Orban in an election in April after 16 years, has said he would use his super majority in parliament to unwind and change legislation passed by Orban’s Fidesz, including the constitution, with the aim of restoring democratic checks and balances.
According to the draft amendment on parliament’s website, those who had previously held the role of prime minister for at least eight years “cannot be elected prime minister.” This applies to prime ministerial terms held after the date of May 2, 1990.
It also says the prime minister would have to leave office after a total of eight years, or two terms.
The amendment also paves the way to the dissolution of the Sovereignty Protection Office, a body set up by Orban in 2023 that used to list media regarded as a threat to Hungary’s sovereignty, and had the right to “probe activities that threaten the country’s sovereignty.”
Based on the bill, Magyar’s government would in addition reclaim the founders’ rights of so-called public-interest asset management foundations which maintain almost two dozen universities, and the government could dissolve the foundations.
In that case state assets worth hundreds of billions of forints and transferred to these foundations by Orban’s government would return to the state.
“The amendment makes it clear that although the foundations … are private entities, their assets are national assets,” it says.
(Reporting by Krisztina Than; Editing by Aidan Lewis)
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