QUITO, March 13 (Reuters) - Ecuadorean President Rafael Correa has enough support to win re-election in the first round of a presidential election at the end of next month, but many voters are undecided, a poll released on Friday said.
Correa, a leftist former economy minister, would win 46 percent of the vote versus 14 percent for his nearest rival, banana magnate Alvaro Noboa, who lost to Correa in an election more than two years ago, the Cedatos-Gallup poll found.
Ecuador's new constitution says a presidential candidate who receives at least 40 percent of the valid votes with a difference of more than 10 percentage points over the nearest rival automatically wins the election in the first round.
"If the elections were held right now, he would win in the first round. There are still a lot of days of campaigning ahead, but his level of support is very high," Carlos Andres Cordoba, a Cedatos-Gallup representative, said of Correa.
Other pollsters have also shown Correa, a U.S.-educated economist, would win in the first round of the April 26 election.
The new constitution allowed Correa to run for a second term and he called an election after it was approved.
The poll of 2,766 people conducted from Friday to Tuesday with a margin of error of about 5 percentage points found 44 percent of respondents still undecided about the candidates.
Correa has maintained strong popularity since he took office in January 2007, thanks to his policies to help the poor majority, his moves to increase state control over major industries and tough stance against foreign companies.
The opposition, fractured among traditional political parties and other movements, says Correa has used state resources to carry out his re-election campaign.
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