Ferenc Gelencsér | |
Office: | Leader of Momentum Movement |
Predecessor: | Anna Donáth |
Party: | Momentum Movement |
Office1: | Member of the National Assembly |
Birth Date: | 21 July 1990 |
Birth Place: | Székesfehérvár, Hungary |
Termstart: | 29 May 2022 |
Termstart1: | 2 May 2022 |
Ferenc József Gelencsér (21 July 1990) is a Hungarian politician, member of the National Assembly, and leader of the Momentum Movement party since 2022.[1] [2]
Gelencsér comes from a conservative family with classic right-wing values. His father was a founding member of the Hungarian Democratic Forum.
He graduated in International Studies from Eötvös Loránd University. In 2013, he spent some time in India working for a foundation that helps Tibetan refugees. From 2018 to 2019 he worked as a sales assistant at Di Verdi Hotel Kft. and in 2019 as a financial analyst at Eaton Hungary Kft.
In 2016, he co-founded the Momentum Movement and became the president of the party's 1st district branch.
In the 2019 local elections, Ferenc Gelencsér won a mandate of the Budapest I. district No. 5 single mandate constituency as a joint candidate of United for Hungary.
He ran unsuccessfully in the 2021 opposition primary as a challenger to LMP politician Antal Csárdi in Budapest's parliamentary constituency No. 1.[3] However, he was placed 26th on the joint opposition list as the third name of his party.[4]
In the 2022 parliamentary election, Gelencsér was elected to parliament from the opposition joint list. The Momentum faction elected him deputy leader.[5] He wanted to be a member of two parliamentary committees, the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committees, but was rejected by House Speaker László Kövér, without giving reasons.[6]
Anna Donáth, who had been Momentum's leader since November 2021, announced on 9 May 2022 that she was pregnant, and would not stand for the party's renewal election. Ferenc Gelencsér then announced on 23 May that he would become the party's leader.[7] In addition to him, Miklós Hajnal and Gábor Kerpel-Fronius also entered the race. At the 29 May election, the delegates finally elected Gelencsér. The new party president promised that instead of "aimless Orbán-hate" he would seek to communicate Momentum's ideas on how to solve the country's problems to the electorate.[8] He was elected leader of the Momentum parliamentary group in July 2022.[9]