As I live in Canada for almost thirty years, I am not particularly involved with the political events over there in Europe, despite the fact that I have voting rights in two countries: my native land of Romania, and my ethnic-cultural-linguistic home Hungary, where I spent almost a decade of my life, halfway between Transylvania and Canada. (half of it as a journalist, to make things even worse!)

In today’s interconnected world it is almost impossible to avoid all the news and scandals and being bombarded with opinions by old and newer friends, former classmates and colleagues. Unless I take a well-deserved break from all social media outlets, suspend all my newspaper subscriptions, avoid turning on the radio in my car, and watch only old movies from streaming services… I cannot say I am not affected by what’s going on in the world. Especially, in my dual homelands. Since most of us here in Canada are quite worried about the future in general and what will happen tomorrow, in special, knowing the instability south of the border, one doesn’t need the nerve wrecking news from across the pond.

Yet here we go again. At the end of 2024, the presidential elections in Romania were annulled by the Constitutional Court after the first round; and the whole process had to be repeated in the spring of 2025. Beside the hoi polloi (more commonly known around here as “the great unwashed”) being upset that their candidate who sounded mentally unstable, was disqualified, serious analysts and legislators were also debating the unusual turn of the events. I know all the legalese that went into those discussions, and neither side convinced me completely. Yet. I agree with the decision. But more about that later.

More recently, in Hungary the opposition that came out of nowhere, defeated completely Orbán’s Fidesz party, which ruled uncontested for 16 years. The new party, called Tisza (a play of words: an abbreviation from TIsztelet és SZAbadság party – Respect and Freedom – which incidentally is the name of the second biggest river of Hungary), won and obtained 2/3 majority in the Parliament. If you think that everybody is obsessed in Hungary with the 2/3, you are right. Orbán and his party obtained this kind of two third majority, and they used it very creatively.

I will deliberately not write anything about the alleged corruption cases, the fabulous riches of the party elite, the pedophile scandals, the fear mongering about Ukraine… Let the justice system of the new regime deal with it. And I won’t analyze in details even what I consider the biggest crime of the outgoing system, dabbed NER, the politics that tragically divided the nation, cultivated hatred toward anything that was different, and what is even more painful for me personally, this government “exported” their own divisive hate-politics into every Hungarian minority group outside the borders: in Transylvania (Romania), in Vojvodina (Serbia), in Slovakia, and in Transcarpathia (Ukraine). I am saddened to see my old friends being ready to kill each other, or “just” declaring each other traitors of the nation, while questioning the Hungarian identity of any opponent. As painful as it is, I want o stay out of it.

(Of course, sometimes I get mad and write a post or a comment, advocating for what I think is the best for my nation. Or my homeland. Or both… quite difficult with these multiple emotional engagements.)
The obsession in Hungary with the two third started at the dawn of the new parliamentary era after the collapse of the communism. They declared certain fundamental laws and legislation as requiring two third of the votes in the House to be modified. They even called them the “two third laws”.

When Orbán’s party won a landslide victory in 2010, they realized that Fidesz had two third majority in the parliament, consequently, they could change any law. And as they got similar results in all the following elections before last week’s defeat, they started to change the rules, one step at a time. They modified the constitution, they bought up or annihilated the independent media; state-owned universities were transferred as properties of obscure private foundations with boards appointed by the government; the Academy of Sciences was stripped of its research bodies (with direct control handed to the prime minister); the government confiscated the private pension funds, wiping out the retirements savings of millions. Practically, they turned the public institutions into instruments to build the infamous “illiberal state” – Orbán’s dream. The trick was to seemingly preserve the institutions that characterize a democratic system, but using their overwhelming majority in the parliament, and modifying the laws and rules as they saw fit, transforming those institutions into tools and pillars of their autocratic regime.

And now we come to the legal issues. The chattering classes (especially on the left) were holding their nose, because they allegedly feared to see installed Orban 2.0, reminding that Peter Magyar started his political career in Fidesz. Instead of a landslide victory of the Tisza, they would have preferred a more “diverse” parliament. (Fact: all the leftist opposition parties gradually reduced themselves to irrelevant extras in a movie they didn’t direct.) The fear might be somewhat justified, however due to the calculated legal tricks of the previous regime, without a 2/3 majority nobody is able to change anything. It means that even if nobody wants another party to have two third of the votes in the parliament, they need that setup if they want fundamental changes in the economic, legal, financial systems.

This is the real legal conundrum in Hungary: how to change democratically and lawfully a system which used their power to cement in place all the support for their rule, making sure that a 50%+1 majority would never be able to modify fundamental legislation.

Back to the Romanian legal aspects, the issue there was whether the Court, which according to the constitution has the power to validate the result of the election, did have the power to annul elections. The law doesn’t say it explicitly; it was just inferred from its role. Furthermore, the law refers to “classic” election fraud when the court can invalidate results but doesn’t know anything about information warfare. And on top of that, the decision was based on intelligence reports, which are partly classified. In a strict legal sense, maybe the Constitutional Court overstepped, extended its power too far. However, if we consider the historical responsibility of preventing a course of events that could have led into a Russian vassal state, one can be more forgiving.

When the events around us happen with a speed never seen before, and the technology is always ahead of legislation my miles, these are not only theoretical questions. They can define our future. Even so, it doesn’t get easier. Although some days I feel lucky that my three countries don’t have to deal with a piece of legislation like the 25th amendment.