The report, prepared by OSCE’s Office of Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, said that the election had been administered in a well-organised way but campaign rules were restrictive, the media biased, and there was a blurred line between the state and political parties in campaign activities which ensured the ruling Fidesz party an unfair advantage.

In a statement, the think-tank said that Hungary’s election laws had been passed well before the election, and the opposition had ample opportunity to put forward their position.

The statement also insisted that a system of compensation votes added to the winner did not distort the final result of the election.

The current electoral system is “relatively more disproportionate” than before, but this arose from “changes in the proportions of individual mandates” rather than from the compensations system, it said.

“The new system does not benefit a certain political group but the more popular force.”

It added that the ruling parties would have won 61% of all mandates in the old election system.

In the April 2014 general election, the ruling Fidesz-Christian Democratic alliance secured 133 seats in Hungary’s 199-member parliament, scoring a two-thirds majority.

The think-tank said that the Constitutional Court had not been banned from referring to their earlier decisions and that the electoral districts had not been changed right before the elections but back in 2011.

The list of voters living in other countries could not be manipulated, as suggested in the OSCE report.

Similarly, voters casting their ballot abroad did not suffer any discrimination, it added.

Source www.hungarymatters.hu

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