The chances of the leading candidates of the most popular lists will largely be determined by the marks - "pluses" - that voters make on the ballot papers.
There are 271 candidates from a total of sixteen lists running for nine seats in the European Parliament (EP) in Latvia. This places Latvia third in the EU for the number of candidates per EP seat and first for the number of candidates per million inhabitants, according to calculations by the website europeelects.eu.
The series "Who should be in the European Parliament?" by the "What is Happening in Latvia?" program hosted four debates featuring representatives of the eight most popular political forces according to the polls - the individual ratings of their delegates and other candidates on the list were revealed gradually in the broadcasts with the participation of these political forces.
The top four spots are taken by EP's Trade Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis (chosen by 32.2% of the respondents) and current MEPs Roberts Zīle (28.8%), Sandra Kalniete (26.9% respondents), and Ivars Ijabs (22.6%). The top five is concluded by former Defense Minister and MP Artis Pabriks (22.3%), running from the list For Latvian Development.
The top ten according to this poll is also made up by former Rīga Mayor Mārtiņš Staķis (Progressives) (18.1% of respondents), current MEP Inese Vaidere (New Unity) (16.6% of respondents), MP and former Defense Minister Ināra Mūrniece (National Alliance) (14.8%), MP Rihards Kols (National Alliance) (14.3%), and former Rīga Mayor Nils Ušakovs (Harmony) (13.3% of respondents).
Among the leaders of the less popular party lists, the top-ranked candidate from Sovereign Power is Jūlija Stepaņenko, who is in sixteenth place, and 10.3% of respondents would like to see her among the nine MEPs elected from Latvia. Tālis Linkaits, the number one candidate of the New Conservative Party, is ranked eighteenth in the list of MEPs, supported by 6.9% of respondents.
More than 5% of respondents also supported Lubova Švecova, who is number two on the Sovereign Power list, and Miroslava Mitrofanova, who is number two on the Center Party list, with 5.9% and 5.2% of respondents, respectively, wanting to see them in the next EP.
The SKDS poll was conducted between May 10 and 15. The survey asked 1,505 Latvian citizens, regardless of which list they would vote for in the elections, to select the nine candidates they would like to see as Latvian MEPs. In total, the questionnaire included 40 candidates from all sixteen lists put forward for the EP elections - four from each of the four parties with the highest ratings in previous polls, and three from the next four parties in terms of popularity. The parties with the 9th-12th highest rankings had their number one and number two candidates on the list included in the questionnaire, while the parties with the lowest number of voters in previous polls had only their number one candidate on the list.
