Protected by the Hungarian Prime Minister and ambassador of the pro-natalist policy implemented in the country, this 44-year-old former minister intends to vigorously promote the traditional vision of the family.
“We women raise children, take care of the sick, cook, can be in two places at the same time, earn a living, teach, win Nobel Prizes. We know the power of words, but can we shut up and listen when necessary, and defend our families if danger threatens, ” she recalled just before the vote which was to confirm her as head of state.
The one that the American magazine Forbes designated as the most influential woman in public life in Hungary arrived in Parliament on the morning of March 10, 2022, accompanied by her husband and her three children: “a presence that means a lot to me,” she assured on the social networks.
Of Protestant faith, Katalin Kovak burst into the political life of the Magyars, in the wake of Viktor Orban’s victory in the 2010 legislative elections: after having occupied the post of Secretary of State in charge of family and youth, she became minister in 2020.
It was during this time that she drew the ire of progressive circles, claiming in a video that women did not need to “constantly compete” with men in life, and “earn as much,” and declaring that Hungary wants “neither immigration nor population replacement.”
Not to mention her criticism of the West where “LGBT+ propaganda targets kindergartens and schools,” she denounced in an interview, denying homosexual people any right whatsoever to raise children: enough to attract a stubborn hatred from these circles.
If the function of head of state is ceremonial in Hungary – most of the powers being concentrated in the hands of the government – the election of Katalin Novak is more than a symbol. It is a centerpiece on the political spectrum in the hands of Viktor Orban, with less than a month before the legislative elections which promise to be tight for the current Prime Minister.
Against the latter in fact, the six opposition parties have united in an alliance as unprecedented as it is unnatural, ranging from the most radical right to the extreme left. The fact remains that the election of a woman who assumes conservative Christian convictions is both a pledge of modernity and tradition that could become a winning combination.
By electing Katalin Novak as the first woman Head of State of Hungary, Viktor Orban is reassuring the conservative base of his electorate while sending his opponents a message of modernity a few weeks before legislative elections, the results of which promise to be tight.