By: Domen Mezeg / Nova24tv
“The differences between individual surveys are really big and also unusual. And what is even more unusual are the fluctuations in support that some agencies have measured for specific political parties. This is not the case with the Parsifal Agency; our measurements have consistently shown two important things for two months now: the first is that the Slovenian Democratic Party (Slovenska demokratska stranka – SDS) is firmly ahead of the Freedom Movement (Gibanje Svoboda). And the second is that the results of small parties will decide who will form the next Slovenian government,” said political commentator Borut Rončević, adding that support from the undecided voters for the new face of the left, Golob, might fall even further. The Parsifal public opinion poll, unlike the Mediana and Ninamedia polls, shows different results for the top parties.
The first question in the Parsifal public opinion poll, which refers to the support of political parties, reads: “Which party would you vote for if the elections to the National Assembly were held this Saturday?” And the responses show that the majority of voters would support the SDS party (22. 9 percent), which is followed by the Freedom Movement (13.2 percent), the Social Democrats – SD (7.6 percent), the Left party – Levica (6.3 percent), the List of Marjan Šarec – LMŠ (4.5 percent) and the Let’s Connect Slovenia alliance – Povežimo Slovenijo (3.3 percent).
When checking the data collected on three different dates – on the 17th of December 2021, the 14th of January 2022, and the 17th of February 2022, we can see that support for the SDS party on the date of the latest poll increased from 19.9 to 22.9 percent. It also increased for the second-ranked Freedom Movement, from 10.4 to 13.2 percent. However, the SD party recorded the highest support on the first measurement, when it got 14 percent. Then its support fell to 6.5 percent, and at the last measurement, it slightly rose again, to 7.6 percent. Regarding the latest date of the measurements, the results of some other parties should also be mentioned: the Left party (6.3 percent), Let’s Connect Slovenia (3.3 percent), New Slovenia (Nova Slovenija – NSi) (2.9 percent) and Our Country (Naša dežela) (2.8 percent).
Among the people who already know who they would vote for, the SDS party’s advantage over Golob’s movement further increases
If we only take those who already know who they would vote for (n = 523) and look at the responses to the question “Which party would you vote for if the elections to the National Assembly were held this Saturday?” the results are as follows: the SDS party got 31.2 percent, the Freedom Movement 17.9 percent, the SD party 10.3 percent, the Left party 8.6 percent, the LMŠ party 6.1 percent, the Let’s Connect Slovenia alliance 4.6 percent, the NSi party 4 percent, and Our Country 3.8 percent of all the responses.
Looking at the data that shows fluctuations in support for the party (still for the question “Which party would you vote for, if the elections to the National Assembly were held this Saturday?”), we can see that support for the SDS party has been relatively stable since December last year. Meanwhile, support for the SD party has declined significantly, and support for the Freedom Movement has been on the rise (for the last two months).
We also looked at the data related to the aforementioned question, which measures the fluctuations in support for different parties from the last parliamentary elections onwards, only for the respondents who already know who they would vote for.
Even though the LMŠ party surpassed the SDS party for a while, the latter has had the highest amount of support ever since the government changed, so since the beginning of its term in office.
Then, we looked at the data about those respondents who would definitely attend the elections, which were 416 people. Among those, the highest number of respondents (29.2 percent) would support the SDS party, followed by the Freedom Movement (16.7 percent), the SD party (9.5 percent), the Left party (7.5 percent), the NSi party (3.8 percent), the Let’s Connect Slovenia political alliance (3.6 percent), and LMŠ (3.4 percent).
Then we narrowed it down even more and only looked at the data from the respondents who would definitely attend the elections and who already know who they would vote for – which means we looked at the data from 352 respondents in total. And the results? The majority (34.5 percent) would support the SDS party, followed by the Freedom Movement (19.7 percent) and the SD party (11.2 percent).
Finally, we also looked at the “intersection” between the demographic and the content variable for the aforementioned question. What is particularly interesting is that more men (28.5 percent) than women (17 percent) support the SDS party, and the highest number of its supporters is from the age group of over 55 (28.9 percent). Most of the party’s supporters have completed primary school education (33.3 percent). The SD party has lower support among men (6.1 percent) than among women (9.4 percent), and the majority of its potential voters are also aged 55 or over (9 percent) and are members of the most educated class (10.6 percent).
The data for supporters of the Freedom Movement is also interesting: it appears that the Freedom Movement has lower support among men (11.3 percent) than it does among women (15.1 percent). Most of its potential voters are from the oldest age group of over 55 (17.1 percent) and have a high school education (16.8 percent).
Golob’s support might still fall – this is also why he should not appear at the debates
We asked sociologist, professor, and President of the Supervisory Board of the national media outlet RTV Slovenia, Dr Borut Rončević, to comment on the results of the public opinion poll. Let us remind you that the recent polls of the Ninamedia and Mediana agencies, which are used by the mainstream media, showed very different results from the Parsifal agency’s results – namely, they show that Golob’s Freedom Movement is ahead of Janša’s SDS party. Rončević said that the differences between individual surveys are really big and also unusual. And what is even more unusual are the fluctuations in support that some agencies have measured for specific political parties. This is not the case with the Parsifal Agency; our measurements have consistently shown two important things for two months now.” The first, in his opinion, is that the SDS party is firmly ahead of the Freedom Movement. And another finding is that the results of the small parties will decide who will form the next Slovenian government. According to Rončević, the Freedom Movement cannot get much more support, as there are simply not enough voters for something like that. However, our more detailed analyses, which included some focus groups, show that it is possible that support for the Freedom Movement will be significantly reduced at the expense of the part of supporters who come from the ranks of the undecided. The people who manage Robert Golob from the background also know this, which is probably why they decided that he should not appear in the media and in political debates ahead of the elections.
Public opinion polls underestimate the NSi party, and the SNS party might also be able to enter the parliament
And what does Rončević think of support for the other parties? New Slovenia is traditionally underestimated in public opinion polls. It is a Christian party, and its voters usually hold back in public opinion polls and do not share their real opinion because they are burdened by the historical experience of systemic discrimination in socialism, as well as the regular outbursts of hatred in the post-independence period, which have recently further intensified. “However, I also believe that the ministers of New Slovenia should address their traditional electoral base more decisively. In my opinion, the Slovenian National Party (Slovenska nacionalna stranka – SNS) also has the chance of entering parliament, even though they have fallen behind in the polls. They are currently a parliamentary party, and the party President, Zmago Jelinčič Plemeniti, who is a master of confrontations, will at least have access to the national tv station RTV and the commercial Planet TV, and perhaps to POP TV as well. I also do not think we should forget about the Alenka Bratušek Party (Stranka Alenke Bratušek – SAB) just yet. This party acts as an instrument in the hands of Gregor Golobič that he uses to influence the politics, and in my opinion, a lot of energy will still be invested into Alenka Bratušek.” Probably much more than, say, in the LMŠ party. And what is also important is that there is still a possibility of joint lists on the left – following the example of the DeSUS and LIDE parties, which should not be overlooked. All agencies are working hard, and strategists are calculating further moves.
Rončević also believes that public opinion polls cannot be used as the main source for forecasts when it comes to the number of deputies in parliament, especially not when so many parties are gathered right around the parliamentary threshold. At the moment, it seems that a very small percentage of votes will have a significant impact on the composition of our parliament in the next term. “I do not see the Freedom Movement as an economically oriented party. It is a party that is formally, but not actually, run by an electricity trader, who had an exclusive contract with a nuclear power plant, where he bought cheap electricity and then resold it at a high price, thus producing no added value and not contributing to the greater good.” So, we really cannot describe Golob as a successful businessman. A possible coalition with the LMŠ party and the Left would be another national catastrophe, which probably would not last long. They would only connect out of necessity, and they would probably get tangled up in their own mess quite quickly.
General demographic data on the participants in the survey
The survey was conducted over the telephone, and it included 712 respondents, of which 49.3 percent were women. The average age of the participants is 53.3 years, and the standard deviation is 15.0 years. The majority of the respondents are from the oldest age group (49.0 percent), a slightly smaller share of participants belongs to the middle age group (35.5 percent), and the smallest number of respondents is from the youngest age group (15.5 percent). The majority of the respondents have completed high school (35.3 percent), followed by those with completed high education or higher (28.0 percent), 19.7 percent of respondents have finished vocational school, and 17.0 percent have either completed or have not completed primary school. The majority of the respondents currently reside in a small village or hamlet (56.8 percent), followed by those who live in the city (27.0 percent) or a smaller town (16.3 percent). Most of the respondents are from Central Slovenia (26.0 percent), followed by the Podravska (15.7 percent) and Savinjska (12.1 percent) regions.