The victory of Orban's party in the parliamentary elections in Hungary

Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's Hungarian right-wing Fidesz party convincingly won today's parliamentary elections, according to the first results.

Orban's coalition won 57 percent of the votes, and the pro-European opposition coalition United for Hungary 31 percent, the state election commission announced, after 43 percent of the votes were counted.

Although the counting of votes is still ongoing, everything points to the clear support of the majority of voters for Orbán's populist style of government.

Today's election was expected to be the most uncertain since Orban became prime minister again in 2010, as the six leading opposition parties put aside ideological differences and formed a united front against Fidesz.

However, the leader of the opposition coalition Peter Marki-Zaj currently has 11 percent less than the Fidesz candidate Janos Lazar in his constituency, after 74 percent of the votes were counted.

It's a discouraging sign for Marquis-Zai, the prime ministerial candidate who has promised to end rampant government corruption and raise living standards by increasing funding for the health and education systems.

Opposition parties and international observers point to structural obstacles to the defeat of Orban and cite the ubiquitous pro-government stance in the state media, the dominance of Orban's allies in the private media and the tailoring of constituencies in favor of the government.

Out of 199 members of the Hungarian Parliament, 106 were elected by majority vote, so that the candidate with the most votes wins in 106 constituencies. The remaining 93 mandates are awarded in elections where party lists compete. The threshold for entry of the list into the parliament is five percent of the votes of exited voters, ten percent in the case of a coalition of two parties and 15 percent for alliances of three or more parties.

Hungarian citizens living abroad, as well as more than a million ethnic Hungarians living in neighboring countries, had the right to vote in the elections. Both categories of voters were given the right to vote by Orban, by changing the electoral law.