Opinions

Opinion poll and the 2023 presidential election

Not long ago, a non-governmental organisation released the outcome of a survey it conducted to predict the likely winner of the 2023 presidential election, to the public domain. In its result of the survey, the organisation predicted that the contest would be dominated by three major political parties namely, the All Progressives Congress (APC), the Labor Party and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Not stopping at that, the pollster said it, for now, foresaw the three contending presidential candidates standing as follows: Obi, 51%; Atiku, 25%; and Tinubu, 19%. As usual, many Nigerians hardly trust the judgement of poll surveys. We indeed live in a country where the populace assuredly believes the predictions of prophets, marabouts, priests, palmists, mullahs, sheiks and the oracle more than the scientific guessing and the bias they believe an opinion poll on a coming election represents. Not only in Nigeria is opinion poll before an election is viewed as nothing to worry about or be scared of by political gladiators and their sympathisers, it is so in many developing or struggling democracies. The reasons for this attitude l will return to in due course.

In advanced democracies, opinion polls before election are not viewed lightly. Largely, their predictions are seriously perceived as ominous of what is very likely going to be the true picture of the outcome of the election ahead. This is because, in these democracies, over time, their pollsters have largely come up with near accurate predictions if not very accurate predictions given their technology, predictable voting behaviours and the credibility of their electoral processes. This being the case with most of the advanced democracies, one can then draw the conclusion that different mix of factors that determine the voting behaviours of voters in the developing and developed democracies, have made the predictions of pollsters in the developed climes fairly accurate and much more believable.

However, I must hasten to stress that, in spite of this, instances still exist where pollsters in the advanced democracies have failed in their poll predictions. I draw on a few examples from the USA and Britain to drive home this point.

In the American presidential election of 1948, pollsters had predicted that Thomas Dewey would win, but Harry S. Truman eventually won. Other presidential election results that did not toe the barometer of pollsters in the US included those of 1980, 1996, 2000 and 2016 among others.

In the UK too, the Conservative party’s electoral victories in 1970 and 1992 also defied the poll vane of the pollsters. The Labor Party’s victory of 1974 equally challenged the wizardry of pollsters as their predictions turned out to be wrong.

What all these examples have done to the perception of the citizens of many developing and even developed democracies is that, they have created the impression in them that opinion poll predictions are either viewed as child’s play or at best a game of probability which calls for caution in believing.

Back to the causes of scant belief of and trust in opinion poll predictions in the developing democracies, in most struggling democracies particularly in Africa including Nigeria, public disdain and disregard for public opinion poll predictions before their elections is informed by these democracies’ inability to conduct free, fair and credible election still; the challenge of vote-buying; the constant suspicion of the bias and integrity of the pollsters. Apart from these specifics, generally speaking, political scientists have found that, opinion poll predictions can fail because of the following factors: unrepresentative sample of a large population of voters; statistical errors on the path of the pollsters; coverage bias; late swing votes and false responses by the sample among others.

Since the release of the opinion poll result of the 2023 presidential election which has predicted Peter Obi as the likely winner, not a few of his opponents have discounted the predictions and dismissed it with the wave of the hand. Still, the most keenly perceptive of his opponents has seen the prediction as a ploy by hidden hands to supersize Obi’s popularity or get more hitherto undecided voters to switch their sympathy for him. This is not unlikely. For it is a political strategy. This is what is called bandwagon effect of opinion poll in political science. But Obi has to watch his back for three major reasons as provided by political scientists. One, this early prediction of victory for him is capable of reinforcing false confidence in his popularity and thus relax his vigour of campaign and canvass for votes and he may therefore, eventually lose the election contrary to the scientific vision of the pollsters. Already, Obi is being constantly reminded by other contestants that the crowd Nigerians see in his rallies will not translate to votes. In fact in some quarters, he is mocked for behaving like the snail that carries about its house (shell), suggesting rightly or wrongly that Obi only goes about with the same crowd of his Igbo supporters and loud netizens.

Two, the outcome of this early opinion poll lead may also have what political scientists have described as “boomerang effect” for Peter Obi. I demonstrate: The opinion poll as it is has portrayed Atiku, Tinubu and other candidates as what political scientists have described as “underdogs.” The implication of this is that these so created underdogs may now begin to gain more sympathy particularly by voters who have been undecided or apathetic. Also, the underdogs now mindful of the opinion poll outcome will obviously reinvigorate their political structures, strategies and even stratagems. Three, more opinion poll predictions by mushroom organizations projecting other candidates may emerge. It should also be noted that opinion poll predictions before elections are fluid and dynamic and may keep on changing onwards till February 2023. It is therefore, safe to conclude that, this current opinion poll prediction is not an assurance of a settled victory for any of the candidates yet. It must just be seen by all the contestants in the presidential race and their adherents as a pointer and headlight to the fact that great work still lies ahead of them on their “journey to Damascus”.

Dr. Adebisi, a political scientist, writes from Joseph Ayo Babalola University, Ikeji-Arakeji, Osun State.

ALSO READ FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE