WAVING the Hungarian flag with a burnt-out hole in the centre, a legion of far-right protesters tramped through Budapest yesterday in an attempt to take the helm of the country’s revolt against the Government.

“We just want an honest Government, not one driven by foreign money,” said Henrik Windberg, a 27-year-old cab driver whose black sweatshirt read: “I’m a Gentile.”

When speaking to reporters, Hungarian nationalists have become more cautious about voicing the kind of anti-Semitism that bubbles over in their closed sessions. “I’m proud to be a Christian, and to be a Hungarian,” was as far as Mr Windberg would go. Their graffiti is less restrained. “Thieving Jew Demszky,” say the daubed slogans, referring to Gábor Demszky, the Mayor of Budapest.

The rally yesterday was organised by the Hungarian Justice and Life party (MIEP), one of two extremist groupings at the hub of the anti-government protest since they combined to bring the country to the brink of chaos six days ago. The other is Jobbik (Movement for a Better Hungary).

The leader of MIEP, István Csurka, a bear-like white-haired 72-year-old playwright, is one of the most sinister figures in the nationalist undergrowth of Central Europe. His anti-Semitic rhetoric, denouncing Jews for their collaboration with communists and their role in global finance, is familiar territory. But Mr Csurka takes prejudice to crazy heights: 178 Hungarian estate agencies, he claimed, are in Jewish hands in a secret attempt to buy up the country. “This party is anti-Western, anti-capitalist, anti-communist and anti-liberal, and believes that all these enemies are either Jewish or commanded by Jews,” Miklós Haraszti, a former dissident, said.

Mr Csurka has slipped in and out of Parliament over the past decade. Currently he is out and MIEP and Jobbik — who have formed an alliance called the Third Way — are counting on the unrest to win votes in local council elections on October 1. That means banging the drum at rallies across the country.

Mr Csurka and his friends are exploiting a power vacuum. Fidesz, the mainstream conservative party led by Viktor Orbán, first let the genie out of the bottle. “In exchange for MIEP’s support, Mr Orbán refused to distance himself from Csurka’s views,” Mr Haraszti wrote in an analysis of the Hungarian right wing. Now MIEP and Jobbik are using the anti-government rallies to break free and carve out their own identity again.

“This is not a spontaneous people’s uprising,” said Krisztián Szabados, a political scientist from the Political Capital research group. “Orbán sucked up the whole of the right-wing political spectrum over the past few years — now he can no longer control the mob.”

The interplay of the Hungarian right-wing groups can best be observed through the windows of Café Parliament, which looks out on to the green common in front of Parliament. From the café Mr Csurka’s lieutenants send text messages to their people in the crowd, determining which speaker should address the protesters next. By day, the anti-government rallies are little more than soapbox politics, where people shout for a Greater Hungary, bemoan the lot of ethnic Hungarians in Romania and lament the betrayal of the Hungarian nation. MIEP rules. As dusk falls, the crowd swells with Fidesz supporters leaving their offices. The tone becomes milder, except when denouncing the Prime Minister. After midnight the crowd melts away and the hardened football hooligans take over, searching for historically poignant targets (identified for them by MIEP strategists) or simply out for a scrap with the police. Goulash has many ingredients and so, too, does this Goulash Revolt.

Dismay at higher health and pension contributions, the sense that Hungary is becoming suddenly poorer, stirs up a yearning for a time when the country was powerful and sovereign. When was that? Nobody is entirely sure, but the ultranationalists know that nostalgia and self-pity are potent emotions that can be used to their tactical advantage.

Times Recommends

• Tehran cannot live up to its rhetoric
• The new unicycle that will ‘change the world’
• We cannot wish away Iran’s bomb