A poll conducted by the council of ministers' Information and Decision Support Centre shows that presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq came first in the presidential race for the second week in a row with 12% while Amr Moussa came second with 11%.

The poll, reported by the Middle East News Agency (MENA), showed that candidates Abdel Moneim Abul Fotouh, Hamdeen Sabbahi and Mohamed Mursi were in third place with 7% each while Khaled Ali placed last with 1% only.

A previous poll conducted by the same centre (its results were out on May 10) showed that 39% of Egyptians had not decided yet which candidate to vote for while 9% said they supported Abul Fotouh. Shafiq came second with 8%, Moussa with 7%, Mursi with 4% and Sabbahi with 2%.

MP Essam Sultan criticized the fact that the centre conducted polls at a time when the parliament was not notified with any information about the budget of this centre, the number of its employees and those in charge of it.

A question on the elections’ date showed that 56% of Egyptians are aware of the right date while 24% said they do now know the elections’ date. Only 20% mentioned a wrong date.

84% of those who participated in the poll – which was conducted on 1366 individuals, 1221 of whom were responsive – said they will cast their votes, 7% said they will not participate in the elections while  9% have not made up their minds yet.