Presumptive presidential nominee and Central Java Governor Ganjar Pranowo has regained a small lead over his rival Defense Minister Prabowo Subianto in public opinion polls that simulate a three-way contest, but the two figures remained locked in a tight race.

In a survey released by Saiful Mujani Research and Consulting (SMRC) on Wednesday, Ganjar of the Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P) inched ahead of Gerindra Party chair Prabowo in an imagined three-way race.

Presented with the choice of Ganjar, Prabowo and former Jakarta governor Anies Baswedan, 35.9 percent of respondents favored Ganjar, up 5.1 percentage points from his July figure. Meanwhile, Prabowo’s favorability decreased 4.2 percentage points to 33.6 percent, and Anies Baswedan remained in third place, with a slight drop from 21.2 percent to 20.4 percent favorability.

In a two-way matchup, however, the survey found that Prabowo would defeat Ganjar by a margin of 3 percentage points.

"From the results of this survey, it can be concluded that Ganjar and Prabowo are competing neck and neck, and both of them would have had a significant edge over Anies if the election was held when the survey was conducted," SMRC research director Deni Irvani said.

The survey was based on in-person interviews with 4,260 respondents of voting age nationwide from July 31 to Aug. 11 and had a margin of error of 1.55 percent with a 95 percent confidence level.

Ganjar saw his support dip in April after he lent his voice to the PDI-P’s opposition to the Israeli national team’s participation in the U-20 World Cup, a controversy that resulted in FIFA stripping Indonesia of its license to host the event.

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