By: Janja Strah
If the parliamentary elections were held tomorrow, the SDS would get 20.7 percent of the vote (5.3 percentage points more than in September), while the SD would be in second place with 10.7 percent of the vote (0.1 percentage point less than in September). Thus, according to the latest (October) public opinion poll conducted for Nova24TV by the Parsifal agency, the SDS has a 93.4% advantage over the second-ranked party.
They are followed by: Levica (6.3), LMŠ (6.3), SAB (3.3), NSi (3.1) and the Povežimo Slovenijo movement (3.1). 35.7 percent of voters are undecided (graph below).
Compared to the September survey, the SDS gained 5.3 percentage points in October (34.4 percent more). Compared to September, DeSUS (0.3 percentage points or 11.1 percent) and NSi (0.4 percentage points or 14.8 percent) gained among parties in October. The parties that lost voters were: LMŠ (1.4 percentage points), SD (0.1 percentage points), Levica (2.2 percentage points) and SAB (0.8 percentage points). According to the survey, government parties gained 5.5 percentage points, while the KUL post-election coalition lost 4.5 percentage points.
If the election were held this Sunday, 57.9 percent of respondents would certainly vote (evaluation 5), and 11.8 percent would certainly not vote (evaluation 1). The share of those who would definitely go to the polls increased by 4.9 percentage points compared to the September survey, while the share of those who would definitely not go to the polls decreased – by 6.1 percentage points.
If we take into account only those defined, 32.2 percent of respondents would vote for the SDS party. They are followed by SD with 16.6 percent and Levica with 9.8 percent (graph below).
The increase in the share of those who would definitely participate in the elections is related to the increase in the number of respondents who would vote for the SDS. The largest Slovene political party would be voted for by 33.2 percent of those decided and those who will definitely take part in the elections, which is 14.3 percentage points more than the second-ranked SD or 75.66 percent more.
The government of Janez Janša is supported by 31.5 percent of voters, which is 1.3 percentage points more than last month.
If we take into account only those decided and those who would definitely participate in the elections, the current government coalition (SDS, NSi and SMC) would get 39.1 percent of the vote. If we also take into account the support party of the coalition (SNS) and DeSUS, whose MPs support the center-right government, support rises to 46.7 percent, while support for the left wing (post-election) coalition KUL is 42.4 percent. However, an interesting result is obtained if we take into account only the defined and those who will definitely participate in the elections, and at the same time only political parties that would cross the 4% electoral threshold according to opinion polls: parties to the right (SDS, NSi and Povežimo Slovenijo) would receive half and the parties to the left of the center (KUL) another half. With this the support to the right wing parties from the middle increases.
About the survey
The telephone survey, conducted between October 12th and October 15th, covered 707 respondents, of whom 49 percent were women and 51 percent were men. The mean age was 52.6 years and the standard deviation was 15.4 years. The majority of respondents were from the oldest age group (45 percent), the middle age group was less represented (37 percent), and the youngest age group was the least represented (18 percent). Most respondents have completed high school (31.8 percent), followed by those with completed higher education (28.3 percent), 24.2 percent of respondents have a completed vocational school, and 15.7 percent of respondents have completed primary or incomplete primary school. Most respondents come from a village or hamlet (54.5 percent), followed by a town (28.3 percent) and a smaller town (17.2 percent). Most respondents come from the Osrednjeslovenska region (25.2 percent), followed by Podravska (16.2 percent) and Savinjska region (12.3 percent).