Presidential Zugzwang: Peter Magyar Tries Chess, Blunders His Queen

In the game of chess, there is a German word to describe a situation that sometimes arises when one player puts the other into an impossible situation: To be in “Zugzwang” means that a player’s only legal move is a bad one – one that worsens their position, however slightly.

That is the position that the Hungarian government now finds itself in after a slightly audacious plan for the country’s presidency went awry.

The plan, to begin with, was simple: to signal a new post-Orban era and to send a further signal of modernization and moderation to the wider world, the Tisza cabinet broadly decided to replace Orban’s hand-picked president, Tamas Sulyok, with one of Hungary’s highest-achieving women, the chess grandmaster Judit Polgar.

Part One: A Solid Opening Move

The first part went largely to plan: On Monday, 13 July, the Hungarian parliament – in which Prime Minister Peter Magyar has a supermajority – passed a constitutional amendment bringing President Sulyok’s term to a premature end. The passage of the legislation created a brief drama over whether Sulyok would actually sign – as is required – the legislation to abolish himself, but he dutifully complied and signed himself out of existence (figuratively) on 18 July, with the presidency officially being declared, in effect, sede vacante on Monday, 20 July.

So far, so good.

The second part of the plan was to install Polgar.

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Part Two: Put the Queen on the Board

First, a note on the candidate: Polgar’s fame is niche, but she is unquestionably one of the great Hungarians of modern times. By universal acclaim, she is the greatest female chess player in history, having once reached the (unheard of for a woman) global ranking of No. 8 overall. When she achieved the title of grandmaster in 1991, she was just 15 years old, making her at the time the youngest player in history to achieve the accolade. While the global chess community remains a relatively small niche, her prominence within it would have made her appointment global news.

The plan to install her appears to have originated not with Magyar, or even his allies, but with Hungarian sportspeople and business leaders, who saw in Polgar the opportunity to return the Hungarian presidency to the ambassadorial, non-partisan office it had been in the pre-Fidesz days. But Magyar loved the idea so much that he immediately jumped on it, and inside a matter of a few days, Polgar became the overwhelming favorite.

Part Three: Oops

There was just one problem: Nobody had asked her.

Yesterday, she issued a statement turning the post down. “I do not feel enough strength within me”, she said, “to take on the historic responsibility of uniting a divided nation.”

That refusal has left the government with a problem considerably larger than the loss of its preferred candidate.

Hungary's presidency, of course, is not a powerful office. Executive authority rests with the prime minister and his cabinet. Yet the presidency is constitutionally and symbolically important precisely because it is expected to stand a little above everyday politics, embodying the continuity of the Hungarian state rather than the fortunes of whichever party happens to command a parliamentary majority.

By first removing Sulyok, and only afterwards discovering that its intended successor was unavailable, the government has managed to create a vacancy before it had a replacement.

Part Four: Presidential Zugzwang

More importantly, it leaves Peter Magyar in something approaching political zugzwang.

Consider his choices now: He can, if he wishes to resolve the matter quickly, simply nominate an overtly political ally. Such candidates are not in short supply, but to nominate a partisan president would be a reversal certain to undermine the very symbolism that made Polgar so attractive in the first place. Her appeal was not that she was a Tisza politician. It was that she was manifestly not one: She represented competence, international prestige and national achievement while remaining untouched by Hungary’s somewhat vicious political fighting.

Alternatively, Magyar can spend weeks searching for another similarly unifying national figure. Such people do not grow on trees. The longer the search continues, the more obvious it becomes that the government abolished one president before ensuring it had another.

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Neither outcome is ideal. Every available move leaves the government in a manifestly weaker political position than the one it occupied before it made the first.

There is also a lesson here about the style of Hungary's new administration.

Since taking office, Magyar has cultivated an image of decisiveness and momentum, contrasting his government with what he portrays as the complacency of the Orban years. Decisiveness can be politically valuable. But there is a fine line between acting quickly and acting before the groundwork has been done.

If reports are accurate that Polgar was never formally approached before her name became the overwhelming favorite, then the episode suggests a government that allowed political enthusiasm to outrun due diligence.

That is an unforced error. It will not be a fatal one. Perhaps, in chess terms, it is less “Zugzwang” than an old-fashioned blunder. Or, to flatter Polgar: Magyar has thrown away his queen.

Oops.