Hungary's Orban seeks to wipe out communist past

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Orban, who famously demanded as a fiery youngster in 1989 that Soviet troops leave the country, says the policies that have provoked harsh criticism in his current term are aimed at closing the book on the post-communist period.

"The many conflicts were not random bush fires, but the result of very clear government work to end the post-communist era," Orban told the Hungarian Diaspora Council, an umbrella organisation of ethnic Hungarians, late last year.

Critics claim the government is trying to disguise its failures; during its tenure, Hungary's sovereign debt has been downgraded, economic growth has faltered, the forint currency has weakened and the country's image abroad has been tarnished by a string of diplomatic confrontations.

Orban insists he is taking the long view, however - his position is that transformation in the early 1990s was incomplete and it is now up to him to make the tough decisions, however painful.

"'I can't get no satisfaction,' in political terms, has haunted Hungarian politics for 20 years...," Orban told correspondents recently. "I have been frustrated about when at last we would complete it (the transition)."

A NEW VIEW OF THE PAST

He got his once-in-a-lifetime chance in 2010, when voters gave Fidesz a two-thirds majority in Parliament, enough to change any legislation on its own.

Orban had campaigned with the slogan "big victory - big change," and quickly made clear he planned to rock Hungary all the way to its foundations.

One of his first moves was ending loan negotiations with the International Monetary Fund and the European Union, eliminating their tight policy oversight, on the grounds Brussels and Washington were "not Moscow."