Of Andrea Mori
LAWN – The battle with polls was short but intense. In fact, within a week, three were released, two of which reported similar results, while the third was decidedly different. And therefore the citizen/voter’s question is inevitable: “Which of the three is closest to what will be the result of the elections on 8 and 9 June?”.
Let’s see the numbers.
Winpoll survey (on behalf of the Democratic Party)
The interviews were carried out between Friday 10 and Tuesday 14 May 2024 taking as reference the population of Prato, males and females aged 18 and over. The method for acquiring information, as explained in a note attached to the survey, was based on gender, age groups and voting intentions in the last political elections.
The researchers obtained responses from 1,000 respondents, while 2,059 refused. The margin of error, i.e. the data that helps establish how much the estimate could be wrong, is equal to 2.6%.
“Now imagine yourself in the voting booth to elect the new mayor of Prato, who would you vote for between…?”. This is the question that was asked to the interviewees. To this question the centre-left candidate Ilaria Bugetti was the answer given by 48.7% of people, on the second step of the podium is that of the centre-right candidate Gianni Cenni, who despite having a silver medal around his neck it is far behind with 39.2%. However, the candidate who would be the first female mayor of Prato does not reach 50% plus one vote, consequently she and Cenni would go to a run-off.
The other contenders for the office of mayor are far behind: Mario Daneri (Prato Merita) at 4.3%, Jonathan Targetti (Targettopoli) at 2%, Fulvio Castellani (Italian Communist Party) at 1.9% and Paola Battaglieri ( Alternative Goods Commons) at 1.7%.
Simona Casadei of the Italian Animalist Party and Leonardo Bisori of the Popolo della Famiglia were also considered in the survey but, having not collected the minimum number of signatures required, they are out of the running.
Another fact: 16% of those who responded to the survey said that they will not go to vote or that they have not yet decided who to give their preference to.
Swg survey (on behalf of Fratelli d’Italia)
It was conducted with a mixed “Cat-Cami” technique (i.e. interviews carried out by contacting both landlines and mobile phones) on a sample of 700 adults resident in Prato (2,987 did not respond) between Friday 17 and Wednesday 22 May 2024. For the population group examined had quotas for age and sex. The margin of statistical error of the reported data is 3.7%.
The data say that Cenni could take between 41 and 45%, Bugetti between 40 and 44, Daneri between 5 and 7, Targetti between 3 and 5, Battagliare between 2 and 4 and Castellani between ‘1 and 3. The undecided are 10%.
Emg Different Survey (on behalf of Toscana TV)
It was carried out between Monday 20 and Wednesday 22 May 2024 on a representative sample of the adult municipal population by gender, age and education. The information was collected 70% with landline calls and 30% with cell phone calls. The number of people interviewed was 800 out of the 4,411 contacted (therefore 3,611 were rejected).
Only 54% of those who responded said they were certain they would go and vote, 21% probably will, 2% don’t know, 5% think they won’t and 18% are sure they won’t. Based on this, Emg has drawn up two estimates: one based only on the responses of those who will go to vote, the other on the total sample.
In the first case, among the mayoral candidates Bugetti is given at 50%, Cenni at 42.5%, Daneri at 3.5%, Fulvio Castellani at 2%, Targetti and Battaglieri both at 1%.
