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Uribista candidates lead presidential polls

By Manuel Rueda, Editorial Director

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

With two months left until the May 30th elections, candidates from President Uribe’s coalition parties have established a wide lead over opposition candidates according to a survey by IPSOS-Napoleon Franco.

The polling firm asked Colombians who they would vote for in the first round of Presidential elections and found that 36% of respondents preferred former defense Minister Juan Manuel Santos.

Conservative party candidate Noemi Sanin came in second with 17% of voting intention, while opposition candidate results were led by former Bogota Mayor and Green Party candidate Antanas Mockus who came in third with 9%.

The unexpected results seen by Sanin and Santos indicate their rising popularity after their parties received large numbers of votes in the March 14^th congressional elections. 

Sanin had only received 5% of voting intention in polls prior to the congressional elections, according to Semana Magazine, with Santos receiving only 23%.

Mockus is also reeling from his victory at the Green Party primaries in which he beat his main rival by more than 20 points.  Semana says, that prior to these primaries, Mockus only had about 3% of voting intention in Presidential polls.

One candidate that has apparently not benefited from his party’s large number of votes is the Liberal Party’s Rafael Pardo. 

Pardo’s party received the third largest number of congressional seats on March 14^th, but Pardo only had 4% of voting intention in the latest Presidential poll, trailing Polo Democratico candidate Gustavo Petro – 6% -- and independent candidate and former Medellin Major Sergio Fajardo, who received 5%.

If the tendencies described by the IPSOS poll hold until May 30^th, a second round will be needed to elect Colombia’s President, as no one seems to be capable of attaining the 50% of votes  required to win the presidency in the first round.

According to this poll, the second round of elections would be a face off of Uribista candidates  Juan Manuel Santos and Noemi Sanin or it would match Juan Manuel Santos against Antanas Mockus if he is able to overtake Sanin in the first round.