A poll circulating on social media claims that Ulises Apaza, a candidate for the Salvemos al Perú party, leads voter intention for mayor of the San Miguel district in Puno with 23.5 percent support, but fact-checkers found no evidence to support the claim.
The same poll places Javier Paredes, of the Viva Puno party, in second place with 21 percent, followed by Victor Cari, of the Progresemos party, with 15.2 percent. Other candidates are shown with less than 11 percent each.
No author identified
The material circulating online does not identify who conducted the poll. Without that information, it is not possible to determine whether the pollster appears on the Registro Electoral de Encuestadoras, the register kept by Peru's Jurado Nacional de Elecciones (JNE) that authorizes individuals and firms to carry out and publish electoral polls.
The JNE is Peru's National Elections Jury, the body responsible for overseeing the country's electoral processes, including the regulation of surveys published during campaigns.
Missing technical requirements
Under Article 22 of the JNE's Regulation on Electoral Polls during Electoral Processes, a valid survey must include a technical data sheet containing methodological details such as the name of the author, sample size, margin of error, confidence level and the dates the fieldwork was carried out. The poll being shared online includes none of this information.
Spelling and formatting errors
The document also contains several errors. Instead of stating that it was produced in September, it uses the misspelling "setienbre." A stray letter appears in the percentage listed for candidate Javier Paredes, which reads "21.E%." The poll also refers to candidate Bethy Quispe using the misspelled word "reenplazo," rather than the correct term for a replacement candidate.
Location left unclear
Neither the poll nor the text accompanying it specifies which department or province the surveyed "San Miguel" belongs to. Cross-checking the names and parties of the candidates listed against the JNE's Voto Informado portal, an official platform where voters can look up registered candidates, established that the district in question is San Miguel, located in the province of San Román, in the Puno region.
Conclusion
A poll shared on social media places Ulises Apaza, the Salvemos al Perú candidate for mayor of San Miguel in San Román, Puno, in first place with 23.5 percent of voter intention. However, the survey lacks any verifiable basis: it contains writing errors, does not identify its author and does not include the technical data sheet that the JNE requires to validate an electoral poll.
