Hungary parliament votes to remove president from office
Image: BBC News
Hungary's parliament has voted to remove President Tamas Sulyok from office, in the most dramatic confrontation since a new government took power in May.
Prime Minister Peter Magyar's Tisza party used its two-thirds majority to push through the 17th constitutional amendment, ending the terms of both Sulyok and the head of the Constitutional Court, Peter Polt. Sulyok, widely seen as a loyalist of former prime minister Viktor Orban, now has five days to sign the amendment or refer it to the court.
If he refers it to the Constitutional Court, Magyar has pledged to launch impeachment proceedings that would automatically suspend him. He could also resign to avoid a constitutional crisis, something the new government has urged.
Deputies from Orban's now-opposition Fidesz party walked out before the vote, accusing Tisza of building a tyranny. The amendment, they argue, gives the government sweeping power to dismiss public officials at will. "The great irony is that Fidesz have fallen foul of their own concept of power," former opposition presidential candidate Peter Rona told the BBC.
The 2011 constitution, written under Orban, enshrined a "winner takes all" principle that Fidesz used to fill supposedly independent institutions with loyalists. The amendment also removes Constitutional Court judges over 70 and bars deputies who have served three terms from standing again, affecting more than half of Fidesz's current lawmakers.
Since its shock election defeat in April, Fidesz has been in free fall. Orban has barely appeared in public and skipped parliament to watch the World Cup in the US, while his deputy Gergely Gulyas resigned on Monday, deepening the party's turmoil.