Poll: 67% of Respondents Want Greater Regional Influence via Election Law Change

Bratislava, February 21 (TASR) - A total of 67 percent of respondents support a change to the election law that would result in a higher proportion of MPs from Slovakia's regions, while 23.1 percent of respondents to a representative survey by AKO agency oppose such a change. The poll was carried out for TASR between February 5-12 on a sample of 1,000 respondents. When asked: "Do you agree or disagree with the opinion that the Parliamentary Election Act should be changed so that the proportion of MPs from the regions of Slovakia increases when forming the composition of Parliament?" 27.7 percent of respondents strongly agreed and 39.3 percent rather agreed. A total 10.5 percent of the people polled strongly disagreed and 12.6 percent rather disagreed; 9.3 percent could not answer and 0.6 percent didn't want to answer. The strengthening of the regions by amending the election law gained an overall majority in all the regions of Slovakia and was supported by more than half of the voters of each of the parliamentary parties. In Bratislava region, 58 percent of respondents completely or rather agreed, 26 percent completely or rather disagreed; in Trnava region 61 percent supported the change, 30 percent were against, in Nitra region 67 percent were in favour and 22 percent against; in Trencin region 66 percent were in favour and 23 percent against. In Banska Bystrica region 73 percent of respondents supported the change and 23 percent were against it; in Zilina region 70 percent were in favour and 17 percent were against it; in Presov region 68 percent were in favour and 23 percent against; and in Kosice region 69 percent of respondents supported the change and 21 percent were against. The change to the election law, which would result in a higher proportion of MPs from Slovakia's regions, was supported by 53 percent of Progressive Slovakia (PS) voters, while 31 percent were against it. A total of 78 percent of Smer-SD voters supported the change completely or rather, and 16 percent disagreed or rather disagreed. A total of 85 percent of Voice-SD voters were in favour of the change, 8 percent were against it; 71 percent of KDH voters were in favour of the change, 23 percent of the party's voters disagreed; 62 percent of SaS voters agreed with the change completely or rather, 31 percent were against it; 60 percent of voters of the 'Slovakia' party were in favour of the change, 34 percent were against; 79 percent of SNS voters supported the change, and 13 percent of SNS voters disagreed. am/mcs