JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesian Defence Minister Prabowo Subianto is on course to secure over 50% of the votes in the country's presidential election, winning in one round, an opinion survey showed on Saturday, the last day of campaigning.
Prabowo is projected to gain 51.9% of the votes, based on a survey of 1,220 respondents by Lembaga Survei Indonesia (LSI), conducted between Jan 29 and Feb 5.
Trailing him were former Jakarta Governor Anies Baswedan with 23.3% support, and 20.3% for Ganjar Pranowo, former leader of Central Java province, while 4.4% were undecided.
Indonesia's most-watched surveys have consistently put Prabowo well ahead of Anies and Ganjar. On Friday, pollster Indikator Politik also projected Prabowo exceeding the 50% threshold needed to avoid a June run-off between the top vote-getters.
The LSI survey has a 95% confidence interval and 2.9% margin of error, said executive director Djayadi Hanan. That suggests a chance the vote would go to a second round and that the numbers were too close to project who the runner-up might be.
Prabowo's popularity has soared since the ex-special forces commander chose the son of President Joko Widodo, Gibran Rakabuming Raka, as his running mate in October, signalling to voters that the popular, outgoing leader would support Prabowo's ticket, Hanan said.
Jokowi, as the president is popularly known, has been accused of interference and bias over his implicit support for Prabowo, which his allies have denied.
Jokowi has not explicitly endorsed any candidate and has said he will not campaign for any candidate.
Gibran is Prabowo's running mate, owing to a last-minute decision by a court headed by Jokowi's brother-in-law to change eligibility rules, and the president has made several public appearances with the frontrunner.