SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff’s approval rating gained six percentage points since hitting an all-time low in late June after massive nationwide protests, a poll published yesterday showed.
The number of respondents who said they intended to vote for her in next year’s election also rose by five percentage points, according to the Datafolha opinion poll published in local newspaper Folha de S. Paulo.
Thirty-six per cent of Brazilians considered Rousseff’s administration “great” or “good,” up from 30 per cent in late June.
The recovery, though still far below the 65 per cent approval rate she had in March, reflects slightly more confidence in Brazil’s economy as concerns about inflation ease.
Rousseff once had one of the highest approval ratings of any leader in the Western hemisphere.
Rousseff now has 35 per cent of voting intentions, up from 30 per cent in the previous poll, according to Datafolha, which concluded she would not win in a first round vote.
In a similar survey conducted in December, Rousseff had 54 per cent of voting intentions.
Former Environment Minister Marina Silva appears to be gaining ground with voters, rising to 26 per cent of intended votes from 23 per cent. Minas Gerais Senator Aecio Neves had 13 per cent of votes compared with 17 per cent in June.
The poll also showed Brazilians are less supportive of the mass protests that drew 1 million to the streets at their peak in mid-June. The numb
er of Brazilians who said the protests had resulted in positive changes fell to 49 per cent from 65 per cent in Datafolha’s last poll.
The demonstrations dealt with a range of issues including corruption, poor transportation and the amount of money being spent to host the 2014 soccer World Cup. Some say they lacked focus. The 27 percentage point drop in Rousseff’s approval in just three weeks that Datafolha reported on June 29, after the protests, was the sharpest suffered by a Brazilian leader since 1990.
Rousseff’s approval rate rose in July and early August in all geographical areas and is higher among lower income groups, her Worker’s Party base. But the number of Brazilians who intend to vote for her rose the most in the southeast, the wealthiest part of the country.
The number of Brazilians who consider Rousseff’s administration “bad” or “terrible” fell to 22 per cent from 25 per cent five weeks earlier, the poll said.
