Hungary: Hungary's ruling Socialists insisted last night that they would retain power, after preliminary general election results placed them just ahead of their centre-right rivals.
But the Fidesz opposition party clung to hopes of victory and accused the government of breaking election rules by sending text messages to voters on polling day.
With 80 per cent of votes counted in Hungary's first general election since joining the EU, the Socialists had 43.3 per cent of the vote, compared with 42.7 per cent for Fidesz. Turnout shortly before the polls closed was 61.7 per cent.
"I would be very surprised if the Socialists did not hold the lead by the end," said Gabor Torok of the Vision Consulting think tank. The key factor could be the performance of the Free Democrats, who are coalition partners with the Socialists, compared to that of the Fidesz-friendly Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF).
Exit polls suggested the Free Democrats would win the 5 per cent of votes that permits a party to take seats in parliament, but the MDF would not.
The combined Socialists and Free Democrats could then keep Fidesz out of power, even if it became the biggest single party in the 386-seat parliament.
"There are no projections in which the governing coalition does not have a majority," said senior Socialist Ildiko Lendvai.
The tight result ensures a hotly contested second round of voting on April 23rd, when each constituency in which no candidate won an outright majority yesterday will be subject to a run-off between the top two contenders.
If victorious, the Socialists would be the first party to retain power in Hungary since the collapse of communism in 1989 opened the way to free elections.
Such a result would be a triumph for prime minister Ferenc Gyurcsany (44), a millionaire businessman whom the Socialists elected as leader in 2004 to shake up a party that was stale, tired and lagging way behind a rampant Fidesz in opinion polls.
While many Hungarians call him arrogant and question the source of his fortune, Mr Gyurcsany has shaken Fidesz with an eloquent and media-savvy campaign that left opposition leader Viktor Orban looking shaky during last week's televised election debates.
A former communist youth leader, Mr Gyurcsany has sought to modernise his party along the lines of Britain's Labour Party, and he is an open admirer of Tony Blair, who lent him campaign support in Budapest recently.
Mr Gyurcsany advocates a kind of "compassionate capitalism", blending free markets and privatisations with a welfare system to help the poor and disadvantaged. But his critics assail him over Hungary's budget deficit, which is at more than twice the level that the EU demands for countries hoping to adopt the euro.
From a predicted 6.1 per cent of gross domestic product this year, Hungary needs to reduce the deficit to 3.0 per cent by 2008 if it is to adopt the euro by 2010 as planned.
Economists prescribe urgent cuts in state spending on bureaucracy and public services, but both Mr Gyurcsany and Mr Orban have promised voters everything from lower taxes to higher pensions and subsidised energy prices.
After losing the 2002 election after four years as premier, another defeat could spell the political end for Mr Orban, who as a firebrand liberal demanded free elections and the expulsion of Soviet troops from Hungary in 1989 and became Fidesz's talisman.