Jakarta. Central Java Governor Ganjar Pranowo continues to hold a lead over his closest potential rivals for the 2024 presidential election. Despite the narrow margin, recent survey results suggest that his support base has steadily expanded over the past two years.

Research firm Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) revealed on Wednesday that support for Ganjar has surged by 10.4 percentage points since their poll for the 2024 election conducted in May 2021.

The latest survey, carried out earlier this month, unveiled that 35.9 percent of respondents would cast their votes for Ganjar in a hypothetical three-candidate race.

Presently, Ganjar holds a 2.3 percentage point lead over Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto. Moreover, he maintains a comfortable lead over former Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan, who secured 20.4 percent of the votes.

According to SMRC, 10.1 percent of respondents remain undecided.

In the poll by the same research firm in May 2021, Prabowo emerged as the front-runner with 34.1 percent support, followed by Ganjar with 25.5 percent and Anies with 23.5 percent.

"This indicates that Prabowo has been unable to capture the support of undecided voters over the past two years, allowing Ganjar to emerge as the biggest gainer with a 10-point surge," SMRC's research director Deni Irvani, said in a video conference.  

Within this period, Anies experienced the biggest loss of 3 points in his support.

In a simulated head-to-head contest, Prabowo would secure victory with 44.5 percent of the votes against Ganjar's 41.5 percent, the survey result shows.

Deni remarked on the growing enthusiasm among voters as the election date draws near, underscoring a significant decrease in undecided voters from 16.9 percent to 10.1 percent.

The survey, conducted from July 31 to August 11, involved 3,710 respondents and ensured proportional representation from all provinces across the country. SMRC reported having interviewed a minimum of 100 respondents in each province.

The survey comes with a margin of error of plus or minus 1.65 percentage points.