Thousands of Hungarians rallied in Budapest to protest Prime Minister Viktor Orban as the leader of the surging opposition Tisza party vowed to end Orban's 15-year rule.
Orban, meanwhile, stepped up his campaign rhetoric in a separate speech on March 15, pledging to crack down on politicians and journalists who receive foreign funding and again ruling out European Union membership for Ukraine
Hungary is scheduled to hold general elections next year, and opinion polls show the Tisza party, which is headed by former Orban ally Peter Magyar, is surging, in part because of the country’s sputtering economy.
As more than 50,000 backers of Tisza and others rallied in cold weather in Budapest, Magyar pledged to release a popular survey on 12 key economic and political issues in order to hear the "voice of the nation."
"Those who cheat on their own nation should end up in the dustbin of history," Magyar told the crowd. "Our time has come."
Earlier in the day, at a rally to mark the country’s national day, Orban vowed to eliminate what he called a "shadow army" of non-governmental organizations, journalists, and politicians he said were paid from the United States and Brussels.
The comments echoed earlier comments where Orban targeted NGOs and media who received funding from the U.S. Agency for International Development and billionaire George Soros.
"After today's celebrations, comes the big Easter cleaning up as the bugs have survived the winter," Orban said. "We will eliminate the whole shadow army."
Orban’s Fidesz party has proposed constitutional changes that would permit the expulsion of dual citizens deemed to pose a threat to Hungary's sovereignty.
