The Hungarian investigative platform Direkt36 has reported that Prime Minister Viktor Orban's government allegedly used the country's intelligence service to spy on the opposition Tisza Party, aiming to obstruct its participation in upcoming parliamentary elections. This scandal, dubbed "Hungary's Watergate," has raised serious concerns about democratic integrity ahead of the April 12 vote.

According to the investigation, the Constitution Protection Office (Alkotmanyvedelmi Hivatal), one of Hungary's five intelligence agencies, purportedly attempted to recruit technicians responsible for maintaining the Tisza Party's IT system to access internal data and manipulate the election. The operation is said to have begun in July 2025, as polls showed the Tisza Party leading Orban's Fidesz party.

Direkt36 published its findings on March 24, followed by a 90-minute video interview with former police captain Bence Szabo, who detailed the case. Szabo claimed that the Constitution Protection Office pressured his cybercrime division to investigate an alleged child pornography case to seize hardware from two suspects, who were actually IT staff for the Tisza Party. He stated that his warnings about political motives were ignored by superiors.

Last autumn, a data breach exposed personal information of about 200,000 Tisza Party supporters through its app. Orban's government blamed Ukraine for the incident, but Szabo's testimony suggests the leak may have been orchestrated by Orban's power apparatus. The government has not denied the revelations, instead framing the intelligence actions as a response to an alleged Ukrainian espionage attempt without providing evidence.

In a concerning escalation, the government has filed espionage charges against investigative journalist Szabolcs Panyi, whom it labeled a "Ukrainian spy" after he reported on secret ties between Russia and Hungary. Orban has avoided direct comment on the scandal but used militaristic language at a campaign event, stating, "I still have a few bullets left in the magazine that I can use."

Political scientist Miklos Sukosd compared the situation to the end of dictatorship in 1989–90, concluding that "Fidesz is not willing to hand over power and is not abiding by the rules of democracy." The case has sparked widespread debate about the independence of Hungarian state institutions and the fairness of the electoral process.

Source: www.dw.com