Czech poll finds that Drahoš has the biggest chance against Zeman in the second round

Should current Czech President Miloš Zeman make it to the second round of the presidential elections, the candidate with the biggest chance of defeating him may be the academician Jiří Drahoš. The STEM/MARK agency announced that finding yesterday, based on its polling.

Should an even bigger segment of undecided voters trend away from the incumbent in the second round, the agencies say that candidates Pavel Fischer, Marek Hilšer and Michal Horáček could defeat Zeman also. From the polling data it can be seen that if the second round will be Drahoš vs. Zeman, 42 % of voters say they will choose the incumbent and 48 % of voters say they will choose Drahoš, with 10 % currently undecided about that scenario.

If the second round will be Horáček vs. Zeman, 46 % of voters say they will choose the incumbent and 44 % say they will choose Horáček - and again, 10 % of voters say they cannot decide about that scenario yet, according to the polls. If the second round will be Fischer vs. Zeman, then according to the polls the incumbent will get 47 % of the vote and Fischer will get 39 %, with as many as 14 % of voters undecided.

If former Czech PM Topolánek were to face off against Zeman in the second round, the polls find that 56 % of voters say they would choose the incumbent and 29 % his opponent, with 15 % of voters undecided. A Hilšer vs. Zeman contest would yield 46 % for the incumbent, 41 % for his opponent and 13 % undecided.

Zeman would get 49 % of the vote whether facing off against either Jiří Hynek or Vratislav Kulhánek. Hynek would get 34 % of the vote, Kulhánek 35 %, and the remainder in either scenario are undecided.

A Hannig vs. Zeman second round would get the incumbent 51 % of the vote. In that scenario the opponent would get 28 % of the vote and roughly one-fifth of the voters polled say they are not able to decide now about such a scenario.

STEM/MARK also found that hypothetically, more than one of the eight candidates has a chance of defeating the incumbent in the second round. The agencies report that when voters were asked in more general terms about the second round, then any of the possible opponents from among the eight candidates who are not Zeman would receive 44 % of the vote while Zeman would get 39 %.

"Zeman voters are frequently older people with lower levels of education living in smaller communities. Those who would choose his hypothetical rival are more frequently younger, college-educated people from bigger cities," the agencies' press release reads.