LIMA (Reuters) – Right-wing lawmaker Keiko Fujimori is virtually tied with left-wing former army officer Ollanta Humala a week before Peru's June 5 presidential run-off, a poll by survey firm Ipsos showed on Sunday.
Fujimori had 50.5 percent of the vote while Humala had 49.5 percent when null and spoiled mock ballots were excluded in a nationwide survey published by newspaper El Comercio.
The survey of 1990 people was conducted May 21-27 and has a margin of error of 2.2 percentage points.
The two candidates in the polarized race will face each other in a televised debate on Sunday that pollsters say could be crucial.
To woo centrists, Humala, 48, has tried with limited success to distance himself from his former political mentor, fiery Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and recast himself as a moderate like Brazil's popular former president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Fujimori, 36, is firmly backed by the business community and poor women. She is the daughter of jailed former President Alberto Fujimori, who is credited with opening the economy to trade and taming hyperinflation in the 1990s. His government collapsed in a cloud of corruption and human rights scandals in 2000 following a tough crackdown on guerrillas.
(Reporting by Teresa Cespedes and Terry Wade)
