The Hungarian parliament voted to remove President Tamás Sulyok, who was widely seen as a loyalist to former Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, who lost power in April after 16 years.

Prime Minister Péter Magyar’s Tisza party used its two-thirds majority to approve the 17th amendment to the Constitution, ending the mandate of Sulyok and Constitutional Court President Péter Polt.

It was the most dramatic day in parliament since the new government took power in early May, following its surprise landslide victory against Orbán’s Fidesz party on April 12.

Sulyok now has five days to sign the amendment – his own political death sentence – or refer it to the Constitutional Court.

If Sulyok refers him to court, Magyar has said he will begin impeachment proceedings against him, which would automatically suspend him from office.

Another option would be to simply resign to avoid a constitutional crisis for the benefit of the country, as the new government has been urging him to do.

Deputies of now The opposition Fidesz party left parliament before Monday’s vote, accusing the Tisza party of building a tyranny.

Fidesz maintains that the amendment gives the government the arbitrary power to remove any public official from office, effective immediately.

“The great irony of the situation is that Fidesz has not respected its own concept of power,” Péter Rona, a former opposition presidential candidate, told the BBC.

The 2011 constitution, drafted by Orbán’s government, enshrined the “winner takes all” principle.

In office from 2010 to 2026, Fidesz reformed the Hungarian state according to its own will and filled supposedly independent state positions with party loyalists, using its own two-thirds majority.

Tisza’s 141 deputies in parliament applauded when the results of the vote were announced.

The amendment also removes Constitutional Court judges over 70 years of age and prohibits deputies who have served three terms in parliament from running again, which applies to more than half of the current Fidesz deputies.

“I quite agree with the removal of the president,” András Baka, former president of the Supreme Court, told the BBC.

Hungary was governed by the rule of law from 1989 to 2010, he argued. After that, Fidesz captured state institutions and created an authoritarian state.

“And it is now very difficult to dismantle a sophisticated authoritarian regime… that was designed to survive even after electoral defeat,” Baka said.