New Poll Puts Raila Ahead of Ruto in Presidential Race

Azimio la Umoja-One Kenya coalition presidential candidate Raila Odinga would defeat his main competitor Deputy President William Ruto if elections were held today, according to a new poll by Infotrak Research.

The poll released on Wednesday shows that Odinga, 77, would garner 9.3 million votes, representing 42 percent of the total votes cast while Ruto would marshal approximately 8.4 million votes (38 percent). This means the two candidates would battle in a run-off election to decide the winner since none of them would meet the constitutional requirement of 50 percent plus a single vote in the first round.

Infotrak CEO Angela Ambitho said 9,000 respondents from across all the 290 constituencies in 47 counties were interviewed during the survey conducted between May 23nd and 27th. The survey's margin of error was plus or minus one.

"What we see in this research is that the naming of the running mates had a great impact on the popularity of the candidates in some regions," said Ambitho.

Odinga, who is giving his fifth try at the presidency, leads in 20 counties while Ruto is more popular in 16. Ruto is running for the presidency on a United Democratic Alliance (UDA) party ticket.

Ambitho said 11 battleground counties in Coast, Rift Valley, Northern and Western Kenya will decide who will be Kenya's fifth president. They include Tana River, Kwale, Lamu, Turkana, Narok, Kajiado, Samburu, Nakuru, West Pokot, Bungoma, and Trans Nzoia.

In regards to gender voting patterns, Odinga slightly leads in the female vote with 38 percent while Ruto has 37 percent of the female vote.