Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán | Olivier Hoslet/AFP via Getty Images Viktor Orbán loses support after university spat: poll Hungarian PM’s personal approval rating also dropped.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's Fidesz party saw a sharp drop in voter support in the wake of the row over the Central European University, an opinion poll published Thursday suggests.

Orbán's higher education bill, passed last month, was seen as a clear attack on the George Soros-funded university and was described by critics as an attack on academic independence. It triggered large-scale protests.

The opinion poll by Median, conducted in the period April 21-26, saw support for Fidesz at 31 percent, down from 37 percent in January.

The far-right opposition party Jobbik was on 14 percent, up from 10 percent in January, followed by the Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP) in third place with 9 percent.

Orbán's personal approval rating was at 40 percent, down by nine percentage points since the January survey.

The poll also suggested that 37 percent of Hungarians wanted the Orbán government to continue after an election scheduled to take place in 2018, down from 48 percent in January.

At an EU summit in Brussels last week, Orbán signaled he was willing to listen to the European Commission’s concerns about his controversial education law.