Hungary vote too close to call

Prime Minister Orban, right, and opposition leader Medgyessy, left, are fighting similar campaigns

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- As the first round of voting in Hungary's parliamentary elections drew to a close Sunday evening, the Hungarian Socialist Party, the country's leading opposition party, held a slight lead with more than 42 percent of the vote.

Eighty percent of the votes had been tallied.

Prime Minister Viktor Orban's conservative Fidesz alliance was running neck-and-neck with the Socialists, election officials said, with more than 41 percent of the vote.

In third place, garnering more than 6 percent of the vote, was the Hungarian Free Democrats' Alliance -- a former coalition partner to the Socialists in the government, which ruled from 1994-98. The liberal Democrats' Alliance was poised to gain entry into the new parliament since only 5 percent of the vote is needed to secure representation.

None of the other six parties running appeared to secure enough votes to reach that 5 percent threshold, election officials said.

Even if the Fidesz ruling party ekes out a victory in the first round of voting, it's unclear whether it would be able to form its own government, since the Socialists are poised to form a coalition with the Hungarian Free Democrats' Alliance. The more likely result would be another coalition government.

A runoff among the top three candidates is set for April 21. The turnout in the first round of voting was 74 percent, the highest voter turnout since 1990, election officials said.

A total of 8.1 million people are entitled to vote in Hungary's parliamentary elections, which are held every four years. Hungary held its first free elections in 1990 after the collapse of communism across Eastern Europe in 1989. There have been four parliamentary elections since then.

-- Managing Editor, MTV Hungarian Television, Gyula Vilagi contributed to this report.