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New poll shows Citizens party gaining ground in Spain

Xinhua, November 2, 2015 Adjust font size:

The November "Metroscope" opinion poll published in the El Pais Newspaper less than two months away from the forthcoming Spanish general election shows the four main parties closer than ever, with the center-right party "Citizens" (Ciudadanos) making up ground to overtake the Socialist (PSOE) party in second place in the standings.

The poll shows that the ruling People's Party (PP) is still favorite to win the general election, although with 23.5 percent of the poll, Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy's party would be over 19 percent down on its showing in the November 2011 elections.

This is partly due to the fact that Rajoy is the least popular of all of the party leaders in Spain, while Albert Rivera, the leader of the center-right Citizens is the most popular and his party stands to take a share of 22.5 percent.

This is a big recovery from June when Citizens had slid to just 13 percent of support and the party's performance in the Catalan regional elections looks to be the catalyst for its recovery.

The Socialists remain unable to capitalize on their positive performance in the May local and regional elections and the party led by Pedro Sanchez has seen support slip from 23.5 percent to 21 percent, while left wing formation Podemos has seen an upturn in fortunes after recent setbacks and has risen from 14.1 percent to 17 percent over the last month.

Meanwhile the United Left, continues to enjoy a slight recovery under new leader Alberto Garzon and now stands on 6.3 percent after having fallen to a low of just 4 percent in July.

What this makes clear is that unless something spectacular happens over the coming seven weeks Spain is facing a hung parliament and anyone wanting to form a government will need to make pacts, with a PP-Citizens pact looking the most likely at the moment, although the question of whether Rivera or Rajoy would be prime minister, sould be very much a moot point. Endit