MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguayan President has 59% approval rate, study shows

President Lacalle Pou's approval rate is waning but remains high nonetheless. Photo: Sebastián Astorga

A new survey has reported that Uruguay's President Luis Lacalle Pou has a 59% approval among the citizens of his country.

The study, conducted by the polling firm Cifra and which was released Tuesday evening through a local TV station, credited the government's positive image “at least in part, to the fact that the worst moment of the pandemic in Uruguay coincided with the moment when vaccines were available.”

However, the new figures mean one percentage point below April's data and six additional points less in July 2020, when 66% of Uruguayans supported Lacalle Pou's policies.

The new survey was conducted between June 24 and July 3, 2021, with 1,003 interviewees nationwide.

Lacalle Pou “continues to have a lot of support from Uruguayans, both regarding his management in general and especially how his government is facing the pandemic,” Cifra said.

The percentage of Uruguayans who disapprove of his management stands at 30%, two percentage points above April's survey.

Among Lacalle Pou's National Party supporters, 95% of them still endorsed the president by July 2020, but that number has also fallen to 89% this month, while within the other parties of the ruling coalition approval also dimmed from 90% to 85%.

“Two weeks after taking office, Lacalle had to face the pandemic. His government, therefore, is judged above all by how it is perceived to be managing this crisis. Until now, a large majority of the population supports the government in its management of the pandemic,” Cifra explained.

“This survey was conducted in the last two weeks, when cases and deaths began to decline, after the highest peak recorded in the country, which occurred between late May and early June,” the study adds.

In July 2021, “when health indicators suggest that 'the worst is over, 29% consider that the government is handling the pandemic very well, and an additional 39% that it is handling it just well.”

Overall, “seven out of every ten Uruguayans have a positive opinion, and less than three” of them every 10 have a negative view.

Cifra also pointed out that this configuration of opinions ”is not as unanimously positive as the one the population had a year ago, but it is almost identical to the one registered three months ago.“

The consulting firm maintained that “the administration's 'added value is that it had all organized so that [vaccines] were distributed effectively to all those who required them.”

At any rate, the level of disapproval is increasing steadily, from 16% last year, to 30% in this last survey, although it remains a minority.

When the most recent study was carried out, the decrease in coronavirus cases and deaths was notorious, compared to the highest point recorded between April and May.

“The large increase in cases in recent months, which placed Uruguay in one of the first places in terms of infections and deaths by several inhabitants worldwide, does not seem to have affected significantly,” said Cifra's report.