Rousseff retains lead in new poll

The first poll conducted after the death of presidential candidate Eduardo Campos (PSB) shows that President Dilma Rousseff (PT) has 36% of voting intentions.

Conducted by the Datafolha Institute in August 14-15 with 2,843 voters in 176 towns and cities across Brazil, the survey was published on Monday (Aug. 18).

In a scenario where Campos's former running mate Marina Silva would replace him as the main candidate, Silva has 21% of the vote, followed by Aécio Neves (PSDB), with 20%. In this simulation, Silva and Neves appear virtually tied in second place and should compete to secure an appearance in the runoffs. Among the eight remaining candidates, three had scores between 3% and 1%, and the other five did not score.

In the simulation with Silva as a candidate to replace Campos, the figures for blank or spoiled ballots fell by 5 percentage points, accounting for 8% of respondents from a previous 13%. A similar decline was seen with indecisive voters, which decreased from 14% to 9% of respondents.

Datafolha has also heard voters in a scenario with no replacements for Campos. In this simulation, Rousseff would have 41% of votes, whereas Neves would figure with 25%. Blank and spoiled votes would total 13%, and 12% of respondents did not know who they would vote for.

In an open-ended survey where respondents were not prompted with any candidate names to choose from, Rousseff's name was brought up by 24% of voters, Neves was mentioned by 11% of respondents as their preferred candidate, and 5% said they would vote for Silva. In the previous poll, Rousseff had been the choice of 22% of voters, as against 9% going for Neves.

In the previous survey released by Datafolha in July, when Campos was alive and running under PSB, Rousseff had had 36% of voting intentions, compared to 20% for Neves, and 8% for Campos. Blank and spoiled votes had totaled 13%, and indecisive voters accounted for 14%.

Translated by Mayra Borges