Andrej Babis

ČTK

Support For Babis Drops In Polls

Andrej Babiš, ANO, Czech Corruption, Miloš Zeman

Prague, April 8 (CTK) – The ANO movement would again clearly win the elections if they were held now, however, its popularity decreased last month, while that of the Civic Democrats (ODS) and the Social Democrats (CSSD) went slightly up, according to the TNS Kantar poll that Czech Television (CT) released today.

 

ANO preferences were 29.5 percent, or the same as the part of the vote that the party led by current Prime Minister Andrej Babis won in the election last autumn.

 

The right-wing ODS would be second, with 14 percent, followed by the Pirates (13.5 percent) whose preferences have also been growing since the elections, and the CSSD, with 8.5 percent.

 

TNS Kantar analyst Pavel Ranocha told CT that the ODS and the CSSD won over voters from ANO. He said some voters are returning to the CSSD which seems to be getting out of the deepest crisis.

 

On the contrary, the right-wing populist Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) preferences further decreased to 7.5 percent. “The SPD may have exhausted some of its key topics and it seems it will have to look for new ones,” Ranocha said.

 

In total, eight parties would enter the Chamber of Deputies, which is the lower house of Czech parliament.

 

The right-wing TOP 09 remained slightly below the threshold to enter parliament, while the Christian Democrats (KDU-CSL) would narrowly succeed and the Mayors and Independents (STAN) and the Communists (KSCM) were slightly above the threshold. However, the KSCM have a large group of hardcore voters, same as ANO and the SPD.

 

The extra-parliamentary Greens would win 2 percent of the vote.

 

The poll was conducted on 847 respondents, who declared they would take part in possible elections, on March 10-29.

 

Results of 2018 TSN Kantar election models and 2017 election:

 

Party

Model March 18

Model Feb 18

Election Oct 17

ANO

29.5

33.0

29.6

ODS

14.0

12.0

11.3

Pirates

13.5

12.5

10.8

CSSD

8.5

7.5

7.3

SPD

7.5

8.5

10.6

KSCM

6.5

6.5

7.8

STAN

6.0

4.5

5.2

KDU-CSL

5.0

5.0

5.8

TOP 09

4.5

4.5

5.3

 

Source: Czech Television (CT); Czech Statistical Office (CSU)