A new poll conducted by the Market Vision agency for the MKD.mk news site shows overwhelming support for VMRO-DPMNE over its once closest rival SDSM, and VLEN taking over DUI in the competition for the Albanian vote. SDSM has even slipped below DUI, to 4th place in the rank of most popular political parties.

When asked who will they vote for if elections were held today, 21.5 percent of the voters opted for VMRO-DPMNE. The ruling conservative party is followed by VLEN with 5.5 percent, and DUI just behind with 5.4 percent. SDSM, which recently tried a reboot with a number of newly appointed senior officials, has slipped to 4th place with 3.9 percent of the vote – a dramatic development for the party that has always been ranked either second or first, and is now overtaken by two Albanian political options.Levica is ranked fifth with 2.9 percent of the vote, and ZNAM, the splinter party that left SDSM, is sixth with 2.1 percent.

Among the political leaders, Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski is easily best ranked, with 27.2 percent of the votes. Ali Ahmeti is second with 5.3 percent, and Kumanovo Mayor and ZNAM party leader Maksim Dimitrievski is third with 3.6 percent, nearly tied with SDSM leader Venko Filipce.

The poll was conducted on 1,200 voters between December 6th and 15th, meaning that the latest developments regarding DUI still haven’t been fully analyzed. The party tried to organize mass protests in Skopje but failed after its top official Artan Grubi was first put on a US black list and then fled to Kosovo and now Albania to avoid corruption charges.