While Colombia’s incumbent president, Juan Manuel Santos, remains locked in first place in opinion polls heading into the May 25 presidential elections, runner-up Oscar Ivan Zuluaga continues to edge second-place rival Enrique Peñalosa.
If the elections were held tomorrow, Santos would win the majority with 27% of the votes with Zuluaga taking 19% and Peñalosa 10%, according to a poll published on Monday.
Poll results
The conservative Zuluaga, who is endorsed by former President Alvaro Uribe’s Democratic Center party, has been steadily gaining momentum since March.
Zuluaga poll results
The centrist Peñalosa of the Green Alliance has been in decline since April.
Peñalosa poll results
Although the three leading presidential hopefuls vary little on economic issues such as education, development and public security, their main dividing point is over how to handle ongoing peace talks with the FARC, Colombia’s oldest and largest guerrilla organization.
Both Santos and Peñalosa seek to continue ongoing peace talks with the FARC, which Santos declared would result in a deal before the end of the year.
MORE: Santos confident FARC talks will result in peace deal before end of 2014
On the other hand, the Democratic Center candidate would require that the FARC receive harsher terms and conditions if peace talks were to continue.
Out of 2,500 people polled, the majority were middle-class, high school educated citizens between the ages of 26 and 55.
A formal date has not yet been set for the second round of elections; however, it is expected to take place in June.
Sources
- Santos y Zuluaga irian a segunda vuelta, segun encuesta Polimetrica (Caracol Radio)
- Colombia’s Santos keeps lead in opinion poll on election; rival gains (Reuters)
- Polimetrica (Cifras y Conceptos)