Serbian opposition leader says some pollsters falsifying data

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Opposition leader Dragan Djilas said on Thursday that some pollsters are falsifying data at the orders of the Serbian President.

“Some agencies don’t have the know how or staff to conduct quality polls,” Djilas wrote in an op-ed piece for Belgrade daily Danas. He added that some of those pollster agencies can’t be trusted.

According to Djilas, his Party of Freedom and Justice (SSP) has been conducting opinion polls for the past 18 months. “We don’t name the agencies because an agency that said it had data on what Serbians really think would not have a single commercial client,” he said.

He said that the polls done for his party since October 2020 showed that the ruling coalition (Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) and others in their coalition) enjoy 48 percent support among the electorate, the same as the entire opposition including some parties which might side with the SNS after the elections, with national minorities drawing 4 percent of the vote. “In Belgrade, that ratio is 60 to 40 percent in favor of the opposition,” Djilas wrote.