Hungarians to pick Orban's 2022 contender in tight opposition primary

FILE PHOTO: Klara Dobrev, candidate of the opposition party Democratic Coalition running in the race to become the opposition's joint candidate for prime minister, meets with supporters during the first round of the opposition primary election, in Budapest, Hungary, September 28, 2021. REUTERS/Bernadett Szabo/File Photo

BUDAPEST (Reuters) - Hungarians will choose between leftist European lawmaker Klara Dobrev and conservative "outsider" Peter Marki-Zay in a primary this weekend to lead an unprecedented joint opposition bid to oust Prime Minister Viktor Orban in 2022 elections.

The tight race between Dobrev, a 49-year-old lawyer and economist, whose candidacy would raise the prospect of Hungary's first female prime minister, and Marki-Zay, a small-town mayor with no party affiliation, has mobilised hundreds of thousands of voters tired of Orban's nationalist government which has been in power since 2010.