Incumbent Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has secured a third term after being declared the winner of the South American nation's presidential elections, according to the electoral authority.

Venezuelans took to the polls on July 28 in a hotly contested election between Maduro and retired diplomat Edmundo Gonzalez, the face of a coalition of opposition parties.

The results were expected to be challenged by opposition parties, who allege widespread fraud in counting of votes.

The National Electoral Council (CNE) said that with 80 percent of votes counted, Maduro had secured 51.2 percent of the vote, ahead of Gonzalez on 44.2 percent. The CNE said it announced the results as Maduro's lead was insurmountable.

Maduro's United Socialist Party has been in power for a quarter of a century, with Maduro in office as president since 2013 after the death of Hugo Chavez. His next six-year term starts in 2025.

The president went into the election trailing in opinion polls with opposition parties blaming him for an economic contraction unprecedented outside wartime.

Gonzalez represented the Democratic Unity Platform after being chosen in April to replace Maria Corina Machado, who was blocked from running in elections for 15 years by the country's Supreme Tribunal of Justice.

Eight other candidates stood on the ballot but only Gonzalez posed any real challenge to Maduro.

"For the first time in history, there are nine opposition candidates. This has never happened in any presidential election," said Franco Vielma, a sociologist at the Mision Verdad think tank.

"All remained separate, and the traditional opposition candidate (Gonzalez) did not benefit from any withdrawals by other opposition candidates," Vielma said, noting that splitting the vote indicated a severe weakness among the opposition.

Despite enjoying momentum, Gonzalez could not manage to unite the opposition, Vielma said.

Gonzalez had to overcome significant challenges including the fact that he was virtually unknown before being nominated, Vielma said, noting that this worked against the opposition.

"The electoral process was optimal," said Deny Reyes, a director at Radio del Sur in Caracas, the country's capital. "This was a positive and mostly peaceful election."

"The streets are quiet," he said, although he noted that crowds were beginning to gather.

Despite the potential for violence and unrest, the vote was mostly peaceful.

Polls opened at 6 am but many voters started lining up to vote hours before. Some 21 million people were eligible to vote in 15,000 voting centers set up across the country.

According to Vielma from Mision Verdad, Maduro has claimed he "plans to advance the diversification of the economy away from oil dependence, promote small and medium-sized enterprises, and maintain state control over strategic resources".

Venezuela has some of the largest oil reserves in the world and was once one of the continent's richest economies.

However, falling oil prices, domestic shortages, and hyperinflation have seen unrest and the mass emigration of an estimated 8 million Venezuelans.

The writer is a freelance journalist for China Daily.