Jewish chess legend Judit Polgar declines nomination to be Hungarian president

Jewish Hungarian chess legend Judit Polgar says that she will not accept the nomination for president, a day after Prime Minister Peter Magyar said he would ask her to take up the largely ceremonial role.

Electing a new president and drafting a new constitution are key elements ​of Magyar’s plan to dismantle former premier Viktor Orban’s bastions of power, for which Magyar says he received ‌a strong mandate from voters.

Magyar ended the 16-year rule of Orban’s nationalist Fidesz party with a landslide election victory in April.

On Saturday, Hungary’s former president Tamas Sulyok signed a constitutional amendment passed by Magyar’s ruling Tisza party that ended Sulyok’s term as head of state.

Magyar said yesterday that he would ask Polgar, widely regarded as the greatest-ever female chess player, to take up the role of president until a new constitution is passed.

Polgar says today in a Facebook post that she was grateful to be asked.

“However, I do not feel enough strength within me to take on the historic responsibility of uniting a divided nation, so I am unable to accept the request,” she writes.

Polgar, subject of the documentary, “Queen of Chess,” released in February, is the only female player to have been ranked in the world’s top 10 of what is a male-dominated sport.

She is the only woman to have crossed the rating of 2700, the threshold that many consider the definition of a “Super Grandmaster”.

Hungary’s parliament will elect a new president who will be in office until a planned new constitution takes effect, or for a maximum of five years.