Hungarian Socialist Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany votes with his son Tamas during municipal elections in Budapest last Sunday. - Reuters

BUDAPEST (Reuters):

Hungary's embattled Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany will call a vote of confidence in his government on Friday, a move denounced by the opposition which threatened huge protests if he did not quit.

Gyurcsany who is almost certain to win the confidence vote, as the governing parties have 210 of 386 MPs, made the move to forestall a call from the country's president for parliament to consider whether he should remain in office.

The prime minister, whose admission on a tape leaked two weeks ago that he had lied to win April's election triggered big street protests, called the vote after being accused by the president of obtaining his victory with "impermissible means".

"I also hear the voice of those who believe it is necessary for the parliamentary majority to confirm its trust in the government and in its programme," Gyurcsany said. "I believe it's necessary for this political trust to become an authorisation."

First time

The vote will be the first time since communism ended in 1989 that a prime minister has taken this option and Socialist vice president Imre Szekeres told Reuters that all of the party's 186 MPs would back Gyurcsany.

There are 18 Free Democrat MPs allied to the Socialists and an additional 6 joint Socialist-Free Democrat MPs.

Foreign investors believe that Gyurcsany, who reversed campaign pledges to cut taxes and imposed higher taxes and lower subsidies after he won a second term in April, offers the best chance to cut Hungary's huge budget deficit.