A clean slate, declared by Magyar, as Gulyás abandons the Fidesz leadership.

Monday’s parliamentary session began with most Fidesz and KDNP MPs absent from their seats. Instead, they gathered elsewhere in the building, dressed in black, declaring a day of mourning for Hungarian democracy.

Inside the chamber, meanwhile, Prime Minister Péter Magyar delivered what may prove the most confrontational speech of his premiership.

The speech was titled Tabula Rasa, Latin for “clean slate”. Its subject was the seventeenth amendment to Hungary’s Fundamental Law, which the Tisza supermajority is expected to approve without opposition.

The amendment package would make several key changes: it would set a 12-year limit on parliamentary service, create a National Asset Recovery and Protection Office, end President Tamás Sulyok's mandate, and reinstate a 70-year retirement age for Constitutional Court judges. This last change would also result in the removal of Péter Polt, the former chief prosecutor who currently leads the Constitutional Court.

Magyar framed the amendment as the first act in dismantling the constitutional machinery Orbán built to outlast his own rule.

For sixteen years, he argued, Fidesz treated the Fundamental Law as a private operating manual, amending it to shield appointments, transfer public assets, and entrench political control beyond the reach of any ordinary election.

“It would be a betrayal of the Hungarian nation if we left this Fundamental Law untouched,” Magyar said, calling it “the foundational document of the Hungarian Cosa Nostra constructed by Fidesz and the KDNP”.

Much of Magyar’s address circled President Sulyok, whose removal remains the amendment’s most incendiary provision.

He accused Sulyok of silence—again and again—while the Orbán government restricted assembly, withdrew Hungary from the International Criminal Court, weakened judicial safeguards, and abandoned children in state care.

“Whenever he had to choose between constitutional principles and the interests of Fidesz, Tamás Sulyok chose the interests of Fidesz,” Magyar said.

He argued that the president could refer a constitutional amendment to the Court only for procedural invalidity, not for substance, leaving Sulyok with no basis to block it.

He stated that Sulyok would have five days to sign the amendment.

If Sulyok refused, Magyar explained, Parliament would initiate proceedings to remove him, and the Speaker would assume the powers of the presidency.

“No holder of constitutional office has the right to override the democratic will of the people,” he said. “The ultimate source of power is always the Hungarian people.”

Magyar also alleged that Fidesz lawyers, under the direction of Gergely Gulyás, had prepared a Constitutional Court submission for Sulyok to file in his own name. Magyar claimed its purpose would be to delay the amendment’s entry into force.

Gulyás has denied the accusation, describing every claim made about him and the Fidesz parliamentary group as false and unsupported.

The most acute moment of political theatre came as Magyar remained at the lectern.

At that moment, news broke: Gulyás had resigned as leader of the Fidesz parliamentary group.

‘This is a great day, Mr Group Leader,’ Magyar said. ‘As of today, you are a free man.’

Gulyás announced his resignation at a joint press conference with Fidesz and KDNP. Meanwhile, opposition politicians, dressed in black, declared their boycott of the session in protest.

Gulyás called the amendment an unprecedented constitutional overreach. The 12-year term limit, he argued, would bar two-thirds of Fidesz, three-quarters of KDNP, and half of Mi Hazánk from standing in future elections.

“The largest opposition parliamentary group cannot have a leader who, because of constitutional restrictions, is unable to stand in the next election,” Gulyás said.

Fidesz would choose a new group leader next week. Until then, Gulyás would remain in post.

His tenure as group leader lasted less than two months.

Gulyás also denied proposing a collective resignation of Fidesz MPs, saying no vote on mandates was held.

The Fidesz and KDNP boycott would last a single day. Their MPs planned to lay a wreath at the grave of József Antall, the first prime minister elected after the fall of communist rule.

Bence Rétvári, leader of the KDNP group, called Monday a black day for Hungarian democracy and accused Magyar of purging anyone who obstructed his ambitions.

Against this backdrop, the opposition’s criticism converges on two elements of the amendment.

First, it would directly end President Sulyok’s mandate. Second, it would immediately apply term and age limits to identified political and institutional leaders, affecting their eligibility.

Magyar tried to answer that criticism as he closed.

He insisted the amendment must not become a licence for future governments to purge officeholders at will or simply exchange one set of loyalists for another.

‘Today’s decision authorises us to bring a single, grave and indefensible situation to a clear and final conclusion,’ he said.

The speech turned personal when Magyar spoke of Vilmos Kátai-Németh, Hungary’s blind minister for social and family affairs.

He accused pro-Fidesz commentator Róbert Ábrahám of mocking the minister’s blindness. Magyar recounted Kátai-Németh’s life as a lawyer, martial artist, father, and advocate, before Tisza MPs rose in ovation.

According to the 2022 census, more than 82,000 blind or visually impaired people live in Hungary.

‘We will never use the body, illness, disability, origin or age of a Fidesz supporter as a political weapon,’ Magyar said.

Overall, the address sought to frame the amendment as a restoration of democratic control after sixteen years of entrenched Fidesz rule.

Gulyás’s resignation gave that argument immediate consequence.

Soon after, Magyar declared a constitutional clean slate while a figure central to the old order stepped aside, facing rules that could bar him from standing again after 2030.

The amendment will pass. Tisza alone holds more than two-thirds of the seats in Parliament.

The extraordinary dispute will start at the Sándor Palace, where President Sulyok must decide whether to sign, challenge, or delay it.

Source: Telex live coverage and parliamentary speech, 13 July 2026.