The pollsters say the results show the split of the Czech public. Photo: Former PM Andrej Babis with new PM Petr Fiala. Credit: Vlada.cz.
Prague, Feb 24 (CTK) – Seven in ten voters of opposition ANO leader Andrej Babis are of the view that president-elect Petr Pavel, who beat him in the January presidential runoff vote, will not defend their interests, while every tenth supporter of Babis thinks the opposite, the latest poll of the NMS Market Research shows.
One fifth of and ex-PM Babis’s supporters do not know.
The pollsters say the results show the split of the Czech public, and so do the respondents’ reasons for choosing their favourite.
While 38 percent of Pavel’s supporters chose him in order to vote against Babis, 16 percent voted for him due to his presentation and 13 percent spoke of his honesty, dignity and politeness. Sympathies, character, opinions and stances were mentioned as the reasons less often.
Most of Babis’s supporters voted for him due to his experience, namely 22 percent, 18 percent said they had voted for him to oppose Pavel and 14 percent said it was because he helped people. Fewer voters stated that they knew what to expect from him and that he did not support the government coalition.
“The available data show that Babis failed to persuade people that Pavel equals the government coalition. Only 5 percent of respondents marked Babis’s not supporting the government coalition as their reason for their vote,” co-author of the poll Michael Bouska said.
The data also show that while Pavel gained most of the votes from his first-round opponents economist Danuse Nerudova and senator Pavel Fischer, neither of whom advanced to the second round. He also received votes from most of the supporters of other failed candidates, senator Marek Hilser, entrepreneur Karel Divis and part of those who did not vote in the first round.
A similar share of people who did not come to the first round of the election then supported Babis in the second round. Besides, he also gained support of about a half of voters of junior opposition Freedom and Democracy (SPD) candidate Jaroslav Basta, who did not succeed in the first round either, while the other half did not go to the second round at all.
Most of the voters, 64 percent, made up their mind about whom to vote for before the first round. Other 22 percent of the respondents decided immediately after the results of the first round were published, 4 percent decided based on the TV debates and 5 percent decided on the day of the election.
The NMS Market Research agency poll was conducted in February on a sample of 1,287 people over 18.
Pavel will be sworn in as president on March 9. After he was elected, he has repeatedly stated that as head of state, he wants to hear out and help his opponents and people who did not vote for as well.
buj/dr/hol
