Hungary Opposition Seeks to Prove Polls Wrong

The chief candidate of Hungary's rickety center-left opposition alliance predicted Saturday on the eve of elections that he would defy the opinion polls and defeat Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

"I don't care about the polls, people are afraid of expressing their views," Attila Mesterhazy, head of the Socialist party and the alliance's joint candidate for premier, told Agence France Presse.

"I believe I will be prime minister in a few days," Mesterhazy said at a rally of around 200 people in a communist-era housing estate in the capital Budapest.

Voter surveys strongly suggest however that Orban, 50, is on course to win Sunday's election hands down, with his Fidesz party on 47-51 percent compared with just 23-28 percent for the opposition alliance.

The only questions are whether the colorful Orban can retain his two-thirds parliamentary majority and if the far-right Jobbik might beat the center-left alliance into second place.

Mesterhazy said that just stopping Orban getting a super-majority "is not a victory. Getting rid of this ruinous government is a victory."

"The campaign was successful, we couldn't do much more, we had no access to much of the media, or the billboards, only social media and meeting people face to face," he said.

Orban has pushed through reams of legislation since 2010 that critics say have removed vital checks and balances on key democratic institutions in the EU member state such as the media and the judiciary.

The charismatic father-of-five has also changed the electoral system in his favor and is accused of spooking foreign investors, cronyism, cosying up to Russia and failing to tackle growing anti-Semitism.

In an interview published Saturday in the pro-government daily Magyar Nezmet, Orban meanwhile reiterated that he has been cleaning up the mess made by eight years of Socialist rule from 2002-2010.

"The left had eight years to show what they can do, and they showed us all right. Why on earth should we believe that the same people and the same parties would not do the same if given another opportunity," he said.

"It's not their promises which destroys their credibility but their incitement to hatred. They're not holding campaign rallies, but inciting hatred sessions. That's their passion."