New Datafolha Shows Draw Between Neves and Rousseff

By Jay Forte, Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – In the survey of the second round of presidential elections taken by Datafolha, candidates Aécio Neves, of the PSDB party, and incumbent Dilma Rousseff, of the PT party, continue in a technical tie. Neves appears with 45 percent of the vote and Rousseff, with 43 percent.

Those undecided are six percent in the survey, and white options, nil and no add another six percent. The results follow closely to previous research of Brazil’s presidential elections, when the PSDB candidate got 46 percent and the PT candidate, 44 percent.

The valid votes, excluding whites, null and undecided, is the same procedure used by the Electoral Court to determine the official result, has Neves and Rousseff at 51 percent and 49 percent, the same percentage achieved in the first survey conducted by the institute in the second round.

Considering the margin of error of two percentage points more or less, the research indicates that there was no change in the framework of the vote between the first survey, conducted on October 8th and 9th, and the second made ​​between October 14th and yesterday, October 15th.

On Sunday (October 12th) Neves received what was considered a crucial endorsement in his bid for the presidency. Third-placed candidate Marina Silva, of the PSB (Socialist Party) officially endorsed Neves after she fell from the race in the first round elections.

The survey was commissioned by TV Globo and the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo and is registered with the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) under the BR-01098/2014 number. The survey reports that 9,081 voters were interviewed.