The Public Opinion Barometer (POB) is not a verdict of what will happen on May 20. It is a collection of indicators telling the people that the results will depend on their vote, executive director of the Association for Participatory Democracy (ADEPT) Igor Botan stated in the program “Important” on TVC21 channel, IPN reports.
“The Public Opinion Barometer measures the social optimism. If the people say that things go wrong, that the current year is worse than last year and that next year they will live worse than this year, be sure that the largest part of the undecided voters will incline towards the opposition,” stated Igor Botan.
He noted the results of the new local mayoral elections in Chisinau play an important role for the parliamentary elections that will take place this autumn. “The results are interesting because Chisinau is the most informed urban center in the Republic of Moldova, as is Balti. From the perspective of the 11 single-member constituencies, the results count a lot. The authors of the amendments to the Electoral Code should be responsible for this result,” said the ADEPT director, adding that for him it is more important who will come first in the first round of voting than who will win the runoffs.
Arcadie Barbarosie, executive director of the Institute for Public Policy, said the electoral period is not good for sociological research given the discussions that could unite or divide the voters that are held in the period. “The fact that Silvia Radu would win 23%, Ion Ceban 30%, Andrei Nastase 15% with 20% of undecided voters means a lot, but not everything. Given the percentage of undecided voters, Andrei Nastase and Silvia Radu could gain more votes,” he stated. According to him, the percentage of undecided voters increases more in the runoffs and it is thus unclear what will happen then.
Arcadie Barbarosie also said that the Institute for Public Policy carries out the Public Opinion Barometer two times a year, no matter whether there is an election campaign or not. The Institute also keeps a database.
