Augsburg (dpa / lby) - Almost eight months before the state elections in Bavaria, according to a survey, the CSU fell below the 40 percent mark in the voters' favour. According to the representative survey by the opinion research institute Civey on behalf of the "Augsburger Allgemeine" (Saturday), Prime Minister Markus Söder's party lost three percentage points compared to the previous month and would get 39 percent of the votes if elections were held in Bavaria now. In January, the CSU came to 42 percent in the Civey poll.
According to the latest survey, the Free Voters, who govern with the CSU, can improve by two percentage points to 12 percent. The Greens remained the second strongest, increasing by one percentage point to 18 percent. The AfD would be ten percent ahead of the Bavarian SPD with 9 percent. The FDP would have to worry about getting back into the state parliament with 4 percent, the left would have 2 percent.
Civey evaluated the answers of 5503 representatively selected people from February 2nd to 16th. Votes are counted from registered and verified Internet users who have provided data such as age, place of residence and gender.
A survey by the opinion research institute Forsa, reported on by the "Süddeutsche Zeitung" (Saturday), came to a different conclusion. Accordingly, the CSU reached 42 percent. According to Forsa, the Greens come to 16 percent, the Free Voters and the SPD are each 10 percent, the AfD comes to 9 percent. The FDP would come to 3 percent. Forsa interviewed a total of 1,022 eligible voters from February 8th to 16th.
In a Forsa survey last October - at that time on behalf of the CSU itself - the Christian Socialists came to 41 percent. In other surveys they ranked at 38, 40 and 42 percent.
Basically, election polls only reflect the opinion at the time of the survey and are not forecasts for the outcome of the election. They are always fraught with uncertainties. Among other things, declining party loyalty and increasingly short-term voting decisions by citizens make it difficult for the opinion research institutes to weight the data collected.
