Bulgaria’s 2016 elections: Tsacheva 27.9%, Radev 22.4% – Exacta Research Group
With two days to go to Bulgaria’s presidential elections, Exacta Research Group said that its latest poll showed GERB candidate Tsetska Tsacheva at 27.9 per cent support and her Bulgarian Socialist Party-backed rival Roumen Radev at 22.4 per cent.
Should these numbers be borne out on November 6, a second-round vote on November 13 seems inevitable. All recent opinion polls have shown no one winning outright victory at the first round.
The order of the candidates in the results of the poll by Exacta, released on November 4, was similar to those in an Alpha Research poll released the night before.
According to Exacta, the candidate of the United Patriots joint ticket of a number of nationalist and far-right parties, Krassimir Karakachanov, was third at 11.5 per cent.
Business person Vesselin Mareshki was fourth (6.9 per cent), Plamen Oresharski – standing as an independent, backed by the Movement for Rights and Freedoms – fifth (6.7 per cent), the Reformist Bloc’s Traicho Traikov sixth (5.5 per cent), ABC’s Ivailo Kalfin had five per cent and Movement 21-National Movement for Stability and Progress joint ticket candidate Tatyana Doncheva 2.5 per cent.
Exacta said that between 56 per cent and 60 per cent intended voting in the presidential elections. In the three-question national referendum also being held on November 6, about 46 per cent to 50 per cent intended voting.
The pollsters noted that support for Karakachanov had grown gradually during the campaign period, garnering a protest vote attracted by his sharp statements on a range of topics that excited people.
Mareshki also had seen a gain in support, while Oresharski’s candidacy was boosted by the MRF’s official endorsement of him. The Reformist Bloc’s Traikov had seen a slight increase in support in the past week.
Exacta held back from predicting what would happen at a second-round vote, saying that it would release poll results on the final day before the run-off – meaning, ahead of the second “Day of Contemplation” which would be on November 12.
The Exacta Research Group poll was done between October 28 and November 2. A total of 1000 adult Bulgarians were interviewed in their homes in 88 Bulgarian cities and towns. The methodology was a direct semi-standardized face-to-face interview. The study was commissioned, implemented and funded by Exacta Research Group.
/Politics
