BUSH IN EUROPE : Status for Hungarians : Bush’s Visit a Spark for Opposition

The leaders of Hungary’s new democratic opposition sat happily in front of a sidewalk cafe on an elegant little square Wednesday evening--and struggled for a moment to catch their breath.

“If we had tried to do this six months ago,” said Tibor Vidos, a spokesman for the new alliance of non-Communist trade unions, “we’d all be in the jailhouse.”

Only nine months ago, Hungary’s political opposition led the furtive, harried life of dissidents under communism.

On Wednesday, however, they met for an hour with the President of the United States, held a spirited news conference in the Communist government’s well-appointed press center and, in between, presided over a lively political salon on the sidewalk in front of the Cafe Spartacus, two blocks behind the Parliament that they hope to take over next year.

“We have seen some remarkable changes,” said Gyorgy Kadar, a physicist and democratic activist with a flair for understatement. “We are far from democracy, but we are clearly marching in that direction.”

Bush Trip a Catalyst

President Bush’s three-day visit to Hungary this week served as a catalyst for a new burst of opposition organizing--and, more important, a new level of legitimacy for the still-emerging groups.

Many of the Hungarians who gathered in the rain to welcome Bush on his arrival Tuesday were members of the Hungarian Democratic Forum, the largest of the new opposition groups.

More significant to the opposition leaders, the visit has resulted in an increased recognition of their legitimacy as players in Hungary’s rapidly reforming political system.

“This is how Bush’s visit has helped us,” Kadar said. “The presence of Bush, the attention of the international media, the moral support of the West--these are all very important.”

It was only last September that the Hungarian Democratic Forum was formed, part of a tentative wave of open political organizing that owed its life to the rise of reformists in the Communist Party.

Since then, the opposition has opened branches throughout the country, organized two massive demonstrations and convinced nearly everyone that it will win a majority if the Communists fulfill their promise of free parliamentary elections next spring.

Still, the memory of four decades of repression makes it impossible for many democratic activists to feel wholly comfortable.

“None of this is irreversible yet,” Kadar said. “We realize that if the Soviet Union turns back from its reforms, we could all end up in prison.”

Speaking Out

But that does not seem to have restrained their tongues. The leaders of various opposition factions have called publicly for the abolition of the secret police, for an end to “dictatorship” and even--if in muted terms--for withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact.

“We want to rejoin the Europe from which we were separated 40 years ago,” said Imre Konya, a leading opposition lawyer.

“That is our dream,” Kadar said. “The Soviet Union is a reality. . . . Patience is a very important word in this country.”

Reality and patience have also decreed a remarkable degree of comity between the opposition and the ruling party. The opposition realizes that its existence depends on the success of the party’s reformist wing, led by Hungary’s most popular Communist, Imre Poszgay.

Indeed, a few in the opposition say they hope Poszgay succeeds in making his brand of communism work well enough that the voters will give him at least a significant share of seats in the new Parliament--instead of what happened in Poland’s elections last month, where the voters grabbed the chance to throw out every Communist, reformist or not.

Poszgay and the other reform Communists, for their part, appear to believe that they need to play ball with the opposition to make their economic reform program work--and to counterbalance pressure from old-line Stalinists.

“It’s only the blind and the deaf who can ignore what happened in Poland,” Poszgay told reporters Wednesday, before turning the auditorium over to the opposition. “Of course, the difference in Poland is that the reformers have the dominant position in the party.”