The PP would win the general elections again if they were held today but the PSOE would manage to significantly reduce the distances to a single point, according to the April barometer of the Center for Sociological Research (CIS) published this Thursday, which also reveals that Vox would consolidate the third position while Sumar would continue its decline from which Podemos would benefit.
Those of Alberto Núñez Feijóo, who in the previous survey took a lead of 2.7 points over the socialists, would be located only one point above those of Pedro Sánchez, in a survey whose field work was carried out between 1 and April 4 in the midst of a climate of political tension due to the succession of information on suspicions of corruption that have been published after the Koldo case.
Specifically, the body directed by José Félix Tezanos gives the PP a vote estimate of 33.5%, half a point below the March survey but half a point above the results of the last general elections. This circumstance, together with a significant growth of 1.2 points in socialist expectations, up to 32.5%, reduces to a single point the 2.7 point advantage that Feijóo took over Sánchez in the last CIS poll. The estimated vote for the PSOE is also eight tenths higher than what it obtained at the polls on July 23, which would also allow it to close the gap compared to then, when both parties were separated by 1.3 points.
All in all, Vox would consolidate third place with a slight increase in its expectations of two tenths compared to March, up to 10.1% of the vote, a percentage that, however, would leave the far-right party still 2.3 points behind. below the results of the last elections.
In any case, the problems for the Government coalition come more from the incessant decline of Sumar that the CIS predicts, of which Podemos would partly take advantage. The formation of Yolanda Díaz would suffer another drop of one point compared to March to reach a vote expectation of 8.2%, 4.1 points from the percentage obtained on 23-J and which allowed, in part, the formation of the Executive. Since Podemos decided in December to separate itself from Sumar and move to the mixed group in Congress, the formation of the second vice president of the Government has lost 3.5 points in vote estimates by the CIS. A percentage that has been mostly collected by the purple formation, for which the April barometer estimates 3.1% of the vote, 0.9 points more than in March.
Regarding the strictly Catalan parties, in the midst of the pre-electoral environment, the effect of the decision of the former president of the Generalitat Carles Puigdemont to present himself as head of the list for the Parliamentary elections can be observed to the extent that his party, JuntsxCat, would overcome two tenths at the same time that its main rival in the sovereigntist camp, ERC, would lose half a point compared to the previous survey. These movements would place both parties tied with a vote estimate of 1.4%.
Pedro Sánchez recovers positions with respect to the evaluation of political leaders and is positioned as the most valued with an average score of 4.22, the same as Alberto Núñez Feijóo had in March. The leader of the opposition remains in second position with a score of 4.14, while Yolanda Díaz, who for a long time remained in first position, falls to third place with a 4.07. Santiago Abascal continues as the worst rated leader with 2.8.
Regarding the preferences of citizens regarding who should hold the presidency of the government, one in four opts for the current head of the Executive while 16% do so for the leader of the opposition. This represents an improvement of two points for Sánchez compared to March. In terms of trust, the President of the Government also improves and while in March 69.5 of those surveyed said they had little or very little trust in him, in April this figure dropped to 68.2%. On the other hand, Feijóo goes from 72.3% to 72.9.
Concern about unemployment and political problems in general, as well as censure of "bad behavior by politicians" has increased in the last month, according to the CIS.
In this way, the economic crisis repeats as the main problem in Spain (28.3%) followed by unemployment, which grows almost 7.5 points compared to March and reaches 25.4% of mentions. In third position is the bad behavior of politicians, with 17.2% compared to 16.8% in the previous barometer, and fourth place is for political problems in general, which in March had fallen to 10.5% ( eighth problem) and return to the top five with 16%. In this section, immigration continues to rise with 11.9% of mentions while the amnesty, one of the main elements of wear and tear on the Government, continues to decline and barely reaches 1% of mentions.
