Hungary has quietly closed a chapter that for years kept its government's hands tied. President Tamas Sulyok signed the seventeenth constitutional amendment - a document that officially marks the end of his presidential powers and his departure from office.

Sulyok was seen as the last remnant of the Orban era at the top of the state. While he sat in the presidential palace, the new government of Prime Minister Peter Magyar hit a wall every time it wanted to push through its reforms - the presidential veto stood like a dam. With his signature, that dam has fallen.

An institutional dead end, solved with a signature

The constitutional change cleared precisely that dead end between the executive and the president. Now Magyar's government can carry out reforms without waiting for approval from the palace. According to the description of the change itself, Hungary is entering a „new political epoch” in which the new authority gains „an open path to implement radical reforms without a veto from the presidential court”.

Sulyok, it is reported, resisted at first - but in the end gave in under pressure. A classic scene: the man guarding the last lock hands it over once he realises he stands alone against an entire political machine.

The Balkans know this story

Amending the constitution to unlock a political blockade - that is a move that needs little explaining around here. Everywhere the constitution is treated as a tool of the current majority rather than a fortress over everyone, such overnight realignments become the norm. The question that remains is not whether Magyar got a clear path - he did. The question is what a government does when nobody tells it „no” anymore.

Because „radical reforms without a veto” sound great as long as the reforms are the ones you want. And then, one day, someone else sits in the same seat - now without the dam that once could have stopped them.