Survey results: Prabowo's electability leads via "top of mind" simulation
Jakarta (ANTARA) - President Prabowo Subianto’s electability remains ahead in the “top of mind” simulation based on a Poltracking Indonesia survey, in line with high public satisfaction with government performance, exceeding 70 per cent.
“32.9 per cent of respondents spontaneously chose Prabowo as a presidential candidate,” said Poltracking Indonesia’s Lead Researcher Masduri Amrawi in an online release of the results evaluating government performance and national priority programmes in Jakarta on Monday.
The “top of mind” simulation is a method or technique to measure what first comes to mind for someone upon hearing a word, brand, issue, or specific category.
“This is a top of mind question, so we ask directly without mentioning names, spontaneously. 32.9 per cent of our voters still choose President Prabowo Subianto. Then there’s Dedi Mulyadi at 13.5 per cent, followed by Anies Baswedan at 9.2 per cent,” he said.
Thus, he said, the findings place Prabowo as the top candidate, followed by Dedi Mulyadi and Anies Baswedan, while other candidates are below five per cent.
This situation indicates that the space for political dynamics remains open, but Prabowo’s electability dominance reflects the strength of public perception towards current national leadership.
This advantage is in line with public satisfaction with government performance reaching 74.1 per cent, satisfaction with the President’s performance at 74.9 per cent, and public trust at 75.1 per cent.
The survey also shows high public satisfaction distribution across various regions. West Java recorded the highest satisfaction at 89.2 per cent, followed by Kalimantan at 87.2 per cent and Maluku-Papua at 83.8 per cent.
Other regions such as East Java recorded 80.7 per cent and Sumatra 74.2 per cent, while Central Java was at 67.5 per cent and Bali-Nusa Tenggara at 69.7 per cent. Sulawesi showed relatively balanced satisfaction levels.
The Poltracking Indonesia survey institute released the results of the evaluation of government performance and national priority programmes, emphasising methodological transparency as the basis for the validity of the findings.
The survey was conducted from 2 to 8 March 2026 on 1,220 Indonesian citizens aged at least 17 years or married, using the “stratified multistage random sampling” method with a margin of error of 2.9 per cent and a confidence level of 95 per cent.
Data collection was carried out through face-to-face interviews by trained enumerators, with sampling units from the village/sub-district level to individual respondents. Validation was done by comparing data with the 2020 Central Statistics Agency census and sample weighting.
Quality control included spot checks on 20 per cent of the sample, telephone re-verification, and the use of a real-time system-based application equipped with photos and geolocation to ensure data accuracy.