Viktor Orbán facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Viktor Orbán
MP
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Orbán in 2024
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| 56th Prime Minister of Hungary | |
| Assumed office 29 May 2010 |
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| President |
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| Deputy |
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| Preceded by | Gordon Bajnai |
| In office 6 July 1998 – 27 May 2002 |
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| President | |
| Preceded by | Gyula Horn |
| Succeeded by | Péter Medgyessy |
| President of Fidesz | |
| Assumed office 17 May 2003 |
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| Preceded by | János Áder |
| In office 18 April 1993 – 29 January 2000 |
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| Preceded by | Office established |
| Succeeded by | László Kövér |
| Member of the National Assembly | |
| Assumed office 2 May 1990 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born |
Viktor Mihály Orbán
31 May 1963 Székesfehérvár, Hungary |
| Political party | Fidesz (since 1988) |
| Spouse |
Anikó Lévai
(m. 1986) |
| Children | 5, including Gáspár |
| Parents |
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| Residences | Carmelite Monastery of Buda 5. Cinege út, Budapest |
| Education |
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| Profession |
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| Signature |  |
Viktor Mihály Orbán ( born 31 May 1963) is a Hungarian politician who has been Prime Minister of Hungary since 2010, previously holding the office from 1998 to 2002. He has presided over Fidesz since 1993, with a break between 2000 and 2003.
Orbán studied law at Eötvös Loránd University and political science at the University of Oxford before entering politics in the wake of the Revolutions of 1989. He headed the reformist student movement the Alliance of Young Democrats (Fiatal Demokraták Szövetsége), the nascent Fidesz. Orbán became nationally known after giving a speech in 1989 in which he openly demanded that Soviet troops leave the country. After the end of communism in Hungary in 1989 and the country's transition to multiparty democracy the following year, he was elected to the National Assembly and led Fidesz's parliamentary caucus until 1993. Under his leadership, Fidesz rejected classical liberalism and created a national conservative platform for itself instead.
Orbán's first term as prime minister, from 1998 to 2002 at the head of a conservative coalition government, was dominated by the economy and Hungary's entry into NATO. He was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2010. In 2010, Orbán was again elected prime minister. Central issues during Orbán's second premiership have included major constitutional and legislative reforms, in particular the 2013 amendments to the Constitution of Hungary, as well as the European migrant crisis, the lex CEU, and the COVID-19 pandemic in Hungary. He was reelected in 2014, 2018, and 2022. On 29 November 2020, he became the country's longest-serving prime minister.
Many political scientists and non-governmental organizations believe Orbán's government has curtailed press freedom, weakened judicial independence, and undermined multiparty democracy, arguing that Hungary has experienced democratic backsliding during Orbán's tenure. Orbán's harsh criticism of the policies favored by the European Union while accepting their money and funneling it to his allies and family have also led to accusations that his government is a kleptocracy. His government has also been characterized as an autocracy. Between 2010 and 2020, Hungary dropped 69 places in the Press Freedom Index, and lost 11 places in the Democracy Index (The Economist); Freedom House has downgraded the country from "free" to "partly free". The V-Dem Democracy indices rank Hungary 2023 as 96th electoral democracy in the world. Orbán defends his policies as "illiberal Christian democracy". As a result, Fidesz was suspended from the European People's Party from March 2019; in March 2021, Fidesz left the EPP over a dispute over new rule-of-law language in the latter's bylaws. In a July 2022 speech, Orbán criticized the miscegenation of European and non-European races, saying: "We [Hungarians] are not a mixed race and we do not want to become a mixed race." Two days later in Vienna, he clarified that he was talking about cultures and not about race. His tenure has seen Hungary's government shift towards what he has called "illiberal democracy", while simultaneously promoting Euroscepticism and opposition to liberal democracy and establishment of closer ties with China and Russia.
Contents
Early life
Orbán was born on 31 May 1963 in Székesfehérvár into a rural middle-class family as the eldest son of the agronomist and businessman Győző Orbán (born 1940) and the special educator and speech therapist, Erzsébet Sípos (born 1944). He has two younger brothers, both businessmen, Győző Jr. (born 1965) and Áron (born 1977). His paternal grandfather, Mihály Orbán, practiced farming and animal husbandry. Orbán spent his childhood in two nearby villages, Alcsútdoboz and Felcsút in Fejér County; he attended school there and in Vértesacsa. In 1977, his family moved permanently to Székesfehérvár. At the age of 14 and 15, while at his secondary grammar school, he was a secretary of the communist youth organization, KISZ, membership of which was mandatory in order to matriculate to a university.
Orbán graduated from Blanka Teleki High School in Székesfehérvár in 1981, where he studied English. He then completed two years of military service. He later said in an interview that before this time he had considered himself a "naive and devoted supporter" of the Communist regime, but during his military service his political views had changed radically.
Next, in 1983, Orbán went to study law at Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest. He wrote his thesis on the Polish Solidarity movement. After obtaining his higher degree of Juris Doctor in 1987, he lived in Szolnok for two years, commuting to his job in Budapest as a sociologist at the Management Training Institute of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food.
In 1989, Orbán received a scholarship from the Soros Foundation to study political science at Pembroke College, Oxford. His personal tutor was the Hegelian political philosopher Zbigniew Pełczyński. In January 1990, he left Oxford and returned to Hungary to run for a seat in Hungary's first post-communist parliament.
Early career (1988–1998)
On 30 March 1988, Orbán was one of the founding members of Fidesz (originally an acronym for Fiatal Demokraták Szövetsége, "Alliance of Young Democrats") and was its first spokesperson. The first members of the party, including Orbán, were mostly students from the Bibó István College for Advanced Studies who opposed the Communist regime. At the college, itself a part of Eötvös Loránd University, Orbán also co-founded the dissident social science journal Századvég.
On 16 June 1989, Orbán gave a speech in Heroes' Square, Budapest, on the occasion of the reburial of Imre Nagy and other national martyrs of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. In his speech, he demanded free elections and the withdrawal of Soviet troops. The speech brought him wide national and political acclaim. In summer 1989, he took part in the opposition round table talks, representing Fidesz alongside László Kövér.
On returning home from Oxford, he was elected Member of Parliament from his party's Pest County Regional List during the 1990 parliamentary election. He was appointed leader of the Fidesz's parliamentary group, in this capacity until May 1993.
On 18 April 1993, Orbán became the first president of Fidesz, replacing the national board that had served as a collective leadership since its founding. Under his leadership, Fidesz gradually transformed from a radical liberal student organization to a center-right people's party.
The conservative turn caused a severe split in the membership. Several members left the party, including Péter Molnár, Gábor Fodor and Zsuzsanna Szelényi. Fodor and others later joined the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ), initially a strong ally of Fidesz, but later a political opponent.
During the 1994 parliamentary election, Fidesz barely reached the 5% threshold. Orbán became MP from his party's Fejér County Regional List. He was chairman of the Committee on European Integration Affairs between 1994 and 1998. He was also a member of the Immunity, Incompatibility and Credentials Committee for a short time in 1995. Under his presidency, Fidesz adopted "Hungarian Civic Party" (Magyar Polgári Párt) to its shortened name in 1995. His party gradually became dominant in the right-wing of the political spectrum, while the former ruling conservative Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) had lost much of its support. From April 1996, Orbán was chairman of the Hungarian National Committee of the New Atlantic Initiative (NAI).
In September 1992, Orbán was elected vice chairman of the Liberal International. In November 2000, however, Fidesz left the Liberal International and joined the European People's Party (EPP). During the time, Orbán worked hard to unite the center-right liberal conservative parties in Hungary. At the EPP's Congress in Estoril in October 2002, he was elected vice-president, an office he held until 2012.
First premiership (1998–2002)
In 1998, Orbán formed a coalition with the Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) and the Independent Smallholders' Party (FKGP). The coalition won the 1998 parliamentary elections with 42% of the national vote. Orbán became the second youngest prime minister of Hungary at the age of 35 (after András Hegedüs) and the first post-Cold War head of government in both eastern and central Europe who had not previously been a member of a communist party during the Soviet-era.
The new government immediately launched a radical reform of state administration, reorganizing ministries and creating a superministry for the economy. In addition, the boards of the social security funds and centralized social security payments were dismissed. Following the German model, Orbán strengthened the prime minister's office and named a new minister to oversee the work of his Cabinet.
In February the government decided that plenary sessions of the Hungarian Parliament would be held only every third week. Opposition parties strongly opposed the change, arguing that it would reduce parliament's legislative efficiency and ability to supervise the government. In March, the government also tried to replace the National Assembly rule that requires a two-thirds majority vote with one of a simple majority, but the Constitutional Court ruled this unconstitutional.
The year saw only minor changes in top government officials. Two of Orbán's state secretaries in the prime minister's office had to resign in May, due to their implication in a bribery scandal involving the American military manufacturer Lockheed Martin Corporation. Before bids on a major jet-fighter contract, the two secretaries, along with 32 other deputies of Orbán's party, had sent a letter to two US senators to lobby for the appointment of a Budapest-based Lockheed manager to be the US ambassador to Hungary. On 31 August, the head of the Tax Office also resigned after protracted criticism by the opposition on his earlier, allegedly suspicious, business dealings. The government was also involved in a lengthy dispute with Budapest City Council the national government's decision in late 1998 to cancel two major urban projects: the construction of a new national theatre and of the fourth subway line.
Relations between the Fidesz-led coalition government and the opposition worsened in the National Assembly, where the two seemed to have abandoned all attempts at consensus-seeking politics. The government pushed to swiftly replace the heads of key institutions (such as the Hungarian National Bank chairman, the Budapest City Chief Prosecutor and the Hungarian Radio) with partisan figures. Although the opposition resisted, for example by delaying their appointing of members of the supervising boards, the government ran the institutions without the stipulated number of directors. In a similar vein, Orbán failed to show up for question time in parliament for periods of up to 10 months. His statements such as, "The parliament works without opposition too..." also contributed to the image of arrogant and aggressive governance.
A later report in March by the Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists criticized the Hungarian government for improper political influence in the media, as the country's public service broadcaster teetered close to bankruptcy. Numerous political scandals during 2001 led to a de facto, if not actual, breakup of the coalition that held power in Budapest. A bribery scandal in February triggered a wave of allegations and several prosecutions against the Independent Smallholders' Party. The affair resulted in the ousting of József Torgyán from both the FKGP presidency and the top post in the Ministry of Agriculture. The FKGP disintegrated and more than a dozen of its MPs joined the government faction.
Economy
Orbán's economic policy was aimed at cutting taxes and social insurance contributions, while reducing inflation and unemployment. Among the new government's first measures was to abolish university tuition fees and reintroduce universal maternity benefits. The government announced its intention to continue the Socialist–Liberal stabilization program and pledged to narrow the budget deficit, which had grown to 4.5% of GDP. The previous Socialist government had almost completed the privatization of government-run industries and had launched a comprehensive pension reform. However, the Socialists had avoided two major socioeconomic issues: reform of health care and agriculture; these remained to be tackled by Orbán's government.
Economic successes included a drop in inflation from 15% in 1998 to 7.8% in 2001. Annual GDP growth rates were fairly steady under Orbán's tenure, ranging from 3.8% to 5.2%. The fiscal deficit fell from 3.9% in 1999 to 3.4% in 2001 and the ratio of the national debt decreased to 54% of GDP. Under the Orbán cabinet, there were realistic hopes that Hungary would be able to join the Eurozone by 2009. However, negotiations for entry into the European Union slowed in the fall of 1999, after the EU included six more countries (in addition to the original six) in the accession discussions. Orbán repeatedly criticized the EU for its delay.
Foreign policy
In March 1999, after Russian objections were overruled, Hungary joined NATO along with the Czech Republic and Poland. The Hungarian membership to NATO demanded its involvement in Federal Republic of Yugoslavia's Kosovo crisis and modernization of its army. NATO membership also dealt a blow to the economy because of a trade embargo imposed on Yugoslavia.
Hungary attracted international media attention in 1999 for passing the "status law" concerning estimated three-million ethnic Hungarian minorities in neighbouring Romania, Slovakia, Serbia and Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia and Ukraine. The law aimed to provide education, health benefits and employment rights to members of those minorities, and was said to heal the negative effects of the disastrous 1920 Trianon Treaty.
Governments in neighbouring states, particularly Romania, claimed to be insulted by the law, which they saw as interference in their domestic affairs. Proponents of the status law countered that several of the countries criticizing the law themselves had similar constructs to provide benefits for their own minorities. Romania acquiesced after amendments following a December 2001 agreement between Orbán and Romanian Prime Minister Adrian Năstase; Slovakia accepted the law after further concessions made by the new government after the 2002 elections.
Leader of the Opposition (2002–2010)
The level of public support for political parties generally stagnated, even with general elections coming in 2002. Fidesz and the main opposition Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP) ran neck and neck in the opinion polls for most of the year, both attracting about 26% of the electorate. According to a September 2001 poll by the Gallup organization, however, support for a joint Fidesz – Hungarian Democratic Forum party list would run up to 33% of the voters, with the Socialists drawing 28% and other opposition parties 3% each.
Meanwhile, public support for the FKGP plunged from 14% in 1998 to 1% in 2001. As many as 40% of the voters remained undecided, however. Although the Socialists had picked their candidate for prime minister—former finance minister Péter Medgyessy—the opposition largely remained unable to increase its political support. The dark horse of the election was the radical nationalist Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIÉP), with its leader, István Csurka's radical rhetoric. MIÉP could not be ruled out as the key to a new term for Orbán and his party should they be forced into a coalition after the 2002 elections.
The elections of 2002 were the most heated Hungary had experienced in more than a decade, and an unprecedented cultural-political division formed in the country. In the event, Orbán's group lost the April parliamentary elections to the opposition Hungarian Socialist Party, which set up a coalition with its longtime ally, the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats. Turnout was a record-high 70.5%. Beyond these parties, only deputies of the Hungarian Democratic Forum made it into the National Assembly. The populist Independent Smallholders' Party and the right Hungarian Justice and Life Party lost all their seats. Thus, the number of political parties in the new assembly was reduced from six to four.
MIÉP challenged the government's legitimacy, demanded a recount, complained of election fraud, and generally kept the country in election mode until the October municipal elections. The socialist-controlled Central Elections Committee ruled that a recount was unnecessary, a position supported by observers from the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, whose only substantive criticism of the election conduct was that the state television carried a consistent bias in favour of Fidesz.
Orbán received the Freedom Award of the American Enterprise Institute and the New Atlantic Initiative (2001), the Polak Award (2001), the Grand Cross of the National Order of Merit (2001), the "Förderpreis Soziale Marktwirtschaft" (Price for the Social Market Economy, 2002) and the Mérite Européen prize (2004). In April 2004, he received the Papal Grand Cross of the Order of St. Gregory the Great.
In the 2004 European Parliament election, the ruling Hungarian Socialist Party was heavily defeated by the opposition conservative Fidesz. Fidesz gained 47.4% of the vote and 12 of Hungary's 24 seats.
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Orbán was the Fidesz candidate for the parliamentary election in 2006. Fidesz and its new-old candidate failed again to gain a majority in this election, which initially put Orbán's future political career as the leader of Fidesz in question. However, after fighting with the Socialist-Liberal coalition, Orbán's position resolidified, and he was elected president of Fidesz for yet another term in May 2007.
On 1 October 2006, Fidesz won the municipal elections, which counterbalanced the MSZP-led government's power to some extent. Fidesz won 15 of 23 mayoralties in Hungary's largest cities—although it narrowly lost Budapest to the Liberal Party—and majorities in 18 of 20 regional assemblies.
On 9 March 2008, a national referendum took place on revoking government reforms which introduced doctor fees per visit and medical fees paid per number of days spent in hospital as well as tuition fees in higher education. Fidesz initiated the referendum against the ruling MSZP. The procedure for the referendum started on 23 October 2006, when Orbán announced they would hand in seven questions to the National Electorate Office, three of which (on abolishing copayments, daily fees and college tuition fees) were officially approved on 17 December 2007 and called on 24 January 2008. The referendum passed, a significant victory for Fidesz.
In the 2009 European Parliament election, Fidesz won by a large margin, garnering 56.36% of votes and 14 of Hungary's 22 seats.
Second premiership (2010–present)
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During the 2010 parliamentary elections, Orbán's party won 52.73% of the popular vote, with a two-thirds majority of seats, which gave Orbán enough authority to change the Constitution. As a result, Orbán's government drafted and passed a new constitution in 2011. Among other changes, it includes support for traditional values, nationalism, references to Christianity, and a controversial electoral reform, which lowered the number of seats in the Parliament of Hungary from 386 to 199. The new constitution entered into force on 1 January 2012 and was later amended further.
In his second term as prime minister, he garnered controversy for his statements against liberal democracy, for proposing an "internet tax", and for his perceived corruption. His second premiership has seen numerous protests against his government, including one in Budapest in November 2014 against the proposed "internet tax".
In terms of domestic legislation, Orbán's government implemented a flat tax on personal income. This tax is set at 16%. Orbán has called his government "pragmatic", citing restrictions on early retirement in the police force and military, making welfare more transparent, and a central banking law that "gives Hungary more independence from the European Central Bank".
After the 2014 parliamentary election, Fidesz won a majority, garnering 133 of the 199 seats in the National Assembly. While he won a large majority, he garnered 44.54% of the national vote, down from 52.73% in 2010.
During the 2015 European migrant crisis, Orbán ordered the erection of the Hungary–Serbia barrier to block entry of illegal immigrants so that Hungary could register all the migrants arriving from Serbia, which is the country's responsibility under the Dublin Regulation, a European Union law. Under Orbán, Hungary took numerous actions to combat illegal immigration and reduce refugee levels. In May 2020, the European Court of Justice ruled against Hungary's policy of migrant transit zones, which Orbán subsequently abolished while also tightening the country's asylum rules.
In the 2018 Hungarian parliamentary election, the Fidesz–KDNP alliance was victorious and preserved its two-thirds majority, with Orbán remaining prime minister. Orbán and Fidesz campaigned primarily on the issues of immigration and foreign meddling, and the election outcome was seen as a victory for right-wing populism in Europe.
On 30 March 2020, the Hungarian parliament voted 137 to 53 in favor of passing legislation that would create a state of emergency without a time limit, grant the prime minister the ability to rule by decree, suspend by-elections, and introduce the possibility of prison sentences for spreading fake news and sanctions for leaving quarantine. Two and a half months later, on 16 June 2020, the Hungarian parliament passed a bill that ended the state of emergency effective 19 June. However, on the same day the parliament passed a new law removing the requirement of parliamentary approval for future "medical" states of emergencies, allowing the government to declare them by decree.
In 2021, the parliament transferred control of 11 state universities to foundations led by allies of Orbán. The Mathias Corvinus Collegium, a residential college, received an influx of government funds and assets equal to about 1% of Hungary's gross domestic product, reportedly as part of a mission to train future conservative intellectuals.
Due to a combination of unfavourable conditions, which involved soaring demand of natural gas, its diminished supply from Russia and Norway to the European markets, and less power generation by renewable energy sources such as wind, water and solar energy, Europe faced steep increases in energy prices in 2021. In October 2021, Orbán blamed a record-breaking surge in energy prices on the European Commission's Green Deal plans.
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In the 2022 parliamentary election, Fidesz won a majority, garnering 135 of the 199 seats in the National Assembly. While Orbán's close ties with Moscow raised concerns, core Fidesz voters were persuaded that mending ties with the EU might also lead Hungary into war. The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe dispatched a full-scale monitoring mission for the election. Orbán declared victory on Sunday night, with partial results showing his Fidesz party leading the vote by a wide margin. Addressing his supporters after the partial results, Orbán said: "We won a victory so big that you can see it from the moon, and you can certainly see it from Brussels." Opposition leader Péter Márki-Zay admitted defeat shortly after Orbán's speech. Reuters described it as a "crushing victory", which also came as a relief for Warsaw's nationalist Law and Justice government.
Anti-LGBT policies
Since his election as prime minister in 2010, Orbán has led initiatives and laws to hinder human rights of LGBT+ people, regarding such rights as "not compatible with Christian values".
Foreign policy
In July 2018, Orbán travelled to Turkey to attend the inauguration ceremony of re-elected Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. In October 2018, Orbán said after talks with President Erdoğan in Budapest that "A stable Turkish government and a stable Turkey are a precondition for Hungary not to be endangered in any way due to overland migration."
In June 2019, Orbán met Myanmar's State Counsellor and Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi. They discussed bilateral ties and illegal migration.
China
Orbán has maintained close ties with China throughout his tenure, and his administration is generally seen as China's closest ally in the EU. Hungary joined China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2015, while in April 2019, Orbán attended a BRI forum in Beijing, where he met the Chinese leader Xi Jinping. He spearheaded plans to open a Fudan University campus in Budapest, which led to pushback in Hungary. He met with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Politburo member and top diplomat Wang Yi in Budapest on 20 February 2023; he afterwards backed the peace plan released Wang Yi concerning Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
Hungary's accession to the Organization of Turkic States
Since 2014, Hungary has had observer status at the General Assembly of Turkic-speaking States, and in 2017 it submitted an application for accession to the International Turkic Academy. During the 6th Summit of Turkic Council, Orbán said that Hungary is seeking even closer cooperation with the Turkic Council. In 2018, Hungary obtained observer status in the council. In 2021, Orbán mentioned that the Hungarian and Turkic peoples share a historical and cultural heritage "reaching back many long centuries". He also pointed out that the Hungarian people are "proud of this heritage", and "were also proud when their opponents in Europe mocked them as barbarian Huns and Attila's people". In 2023, during his visit to Kazakhstan, Orbán said that Hungarians come to Kazakhstan "with great pleasure" because the two nations are connected by "millennial common roots".
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Personal life
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Orbán married jurist Anikó Lévai in 1986; the couple has five children. Their eldest daughter, Ráhel, is married to entrepreneur Tiborcz István, whose company, Elios, was accused of receiving unfair advantages when winning public tenders. (see Elios case) Orbán's son, Gáspár, is a retired footballer, who played for Ferenc Puskás Football Academy in 2014. Gáspár is also one of the founders of a religious community called Felház. Orbán has three younger daughters (Sára, Róza, Flóra) and three granddaughters (Ráhel's children Aliz and Anna Adél; Sára's daughter Johanna).
Orbán is a member of the Calvinist-oriented Hungarian Reformed Church, while his wife and their five children were raised Catholic. His son Gáspár Orbán converted in 2014 to the Faith Church, a Pentecostal denomination, and is currently a minister who had heard from God and witnessed miraculous healings.
Football interests
Orbán is very fond of sports, especially of football; he was a signed player of FC Felcsút, and as a result he also appears in Football Manager 2006.
Orbán has played football from his early childhood. He was a professional player with FC Felcsút. After ending his football career, he became one of the main financiers of the Hungarian football and his hometown's club, Felcsút FC, later renamed the Ferenc Puskás Football Academy. He had a prominent role in the foundation of Puskás Akadémia in Felcsút, creating one of the most modern training facilities for young Hungarian footballers.
He played an important role in establishing the annually organised international youth cup, the Puskás Cup, at Pancho Aréna, which he also helped build, in his hometown of Felcsút. His only son, Gáspár, learned and trained there.
Orbán is said to watch as many as six games a day. His first trip abroad as prime minister in 1998 was to the World Cup final in Paris; according to inside sources, he has not missed a World Cup or Champions League final since.
Then FIFA President Sepp Blatter visited the facilities at the Puskás Academy in 2009. Blatter, together with the widow of Ferenc Puskás, as well as Orbán, founder of the academy, announced the creation of the new FIFA Puskás Award during that visit. He played the minor role of a footballer in the Hungarian family film Szegény Dzsoni és Árnika (1983).
Awards and honors
Foreign
Bosnia and Herzegovina (
Republika Srpska):
Order of the Republika Srpska (2024)
France:
Grand Cross of the National Order of Merit (2001)
Kazakhstan:
First Class of the Order of Friendship (2023)
Lithuania:
Commander's Grand Cross of the Order of the Lithuanian Grand Duke Gediminas (2009)
North Macedonia:
Order 8-September (2013)
Serbia:
First Class of the Order of the Republic of Serbia (2022)
Vatican:
Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Gregory the Great (2004)
Confessional
- Holy Cross Medal of Gratitude (Armenian Catholic Church, 2022)
- First Class of the Order of Glory and Honor (Russian Orthodox Church, 2023)
- First Class of the Order of St. Sava (Serbian Orthodox Church, 2022)
Other honors
- Honorary senator of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts (2000)
- Freedom Award by the American Enterprise Institute (2001)
- Franz Josef Strauss Prize from the Hanns Seidel Foundation (2001)
- Polak Award established by the Maria Polak Foundation (2001)
- Prize for the Social Market Economy by the German Club of Economics (2002)
- Honorary Citizen of Szék, Hungary (2002)
- Saint Stephen Award (2002)
- László Tőkés Award by the László Tőkés Foundation (2003)
- Honorary Citizen of Esztergom, Hungary, twice (2006, 2009)
- Gold Medal of the Foundation of European Merit (2004)
- World No Tobacco Day Award by the World Health Organization (2013)
- Title 'Man of the Year 2013' by Polish magazine Gazeta Polska (2014)
- 'The 28 People From 28 Countries Who Are Shaping, Shaking And Stirring Europe: Class Of 2016' by magazine Politico Europe
- Title 'Man of the Year 2015'at the Economic Forum in Poland (2016)
- FINA Order of Merit (2017)
- Golden Order of the Azeri international magazine My Azerbaijan (2022)
- Supreme Order of Turkic World (6 November 2024)
See also
In Spanish: Viktor Orbán para niños
- First Orbán Government
- Second Orbán Government
- Third Orbán Government
- Fourth Orbán Government
- Fifth Orbán Government
- Orbanomics
- List of prime ministers of Hungary by tenure
