Catalan election: Polls forecast clear win for Socialists with Junts and Esquerra battling for second

With just days to go until the Catalan election, several polls forecast that the Socialists, under Salvador Illa's candidacy, will be the clear winner of the vote on May 12.

Pro-independence parties – and former coalition partners – Junts and Esquerra look to be battling for second place.

Polls also show that liberal Ciudadanos will lose its representation in the Catalan Parliament after gaining 6 seats in the 2021 election, while the conservative People's Party would return as one of the strongest unionist forces in the chamber, surpassing far-right Vox.

CIS, the Spanish public surveying agency, released a poll on Monday, May 6, with percentage shares for each party.

It predicted the Socialists would win the election by a significant margin, with between 29.8%-33.2% of the vote share, roughly the same as the next two parties combined, the two mainstream pro-independence parties Junts+ (15.4%-18.1%) and ERC (15.2%-17.9%).

The CIS poll also predicted the People's Party to take between 9.6%-11.9% of the vote, Vox to get 5.8%-7.5%, Comuns Sumar to take 5%-6.7%, CUP to win 3.2%-4.6%, and Aliança Catalana to earn 3%-4.4% of the votes.

The polls mean that it is difficult to say who will govern Catalonia after the election.

Based on analysis, forming a coalition government would be difficult for either the pro-independence or the unionist blocs.

Overall, there are 135 seats in the Catalan parliament, with the majority standing at 68 representatives.