I have had a lengthy telephone conversation with Tom Wolf regarding the latest Ipsos Synovate poll. Earlier in the day, we reflected on this mind boggler on national TV with my professional senior, Mutegi Njau.
We agreed that the findings were confounding. Indeed Dr Wolf, the lead researcher at Ipsos, admits to one or two mistakes. He pledged to share corrections with media houses. In spite of this, I remain confounded, as a student of social science. Many things in this poll just don’t tie up.
And I am not alone in my perplexity. The social media has been awash with protest. Regrettably, the protest does not address issues. There is nothing strange in this. In Africa, we attack the personalities behind issues. Hence we have failed to scrutinise the Ipsos Synovate report and say what is wrong with it. We have emotively attacked Wolf and his firm, saying all manner of appalling things. I will refrain from demonising them. I will address the study instead.
Any research is as good as the methods and instruments used. As far as I can see, the problem with this poll is deficient methodological rigour. The study design, the field methods and the analysis were weak — indeed poor. Interrogation of 2,002 people to represent an adult voting population of about 20 million is itself not a weakness. The challenge rests in the kind of sampling that is done.
Treatment of demographics — different population identity strata — was poor. There was too much of the same kind of respondent. This did not reflect the true stratum of the national adult population. At one level, for example, the pollster sampled 30 per cent CORD supporters and 49 per cent Jubilee. The study was convoluted as to make this sampling factor look like an outcome of the survey. It placed the horse before the cart. A preliminary matter became a “finding.” You cannot design your study this way and thereafter attempt to credit your conclusions with claims to rigorous criteria of objectivity.
Wolf has not convinced me on his methodology, generally. Here was a clear case for a proportional stratified sample, ahead of random sampling. Attention to nuanced factors that define different segments of the population and their political behaviour was absent. In the end, there was interviewing of more people of the same type and less of another type — from the very start. It is not difficult to imagine the outcome.
But I suspect that there were also problems with data processing and analysis and hence the intriguing and inconsistent conclusions. President Kenyatta’s popularity rating stands at 75 per cent. This is inconsistent with the country’s leadership popularity rating that stands at a comparatively poor 47 per cent in the same survey.
Of course there is a sense in which you could attempt to distinguish between the President on the one hand and “leadership” on the other. You could argue that there are other leaders in the country. That when you put them together, they constitute “leadership.” Accordingly, President Kenyatta’s approval rating stands at 75 per cent. However, “leadership” stands at 47 per cent.
This is a spurious argument, however. We know very well that you cannot separate the President from “leadership.” Our people say that the rat wears its skin. You cannot separate the rodent from its dress and say that you have two things. Kenyatta is “leadership” and “leadership” is Kenyatta. It is his government, his assembly and dance. The presumed gap between Uhuru Kenyatta and “Kenya’s leadership,” therefore, makes this poll to fall flat on its face. Equally significant is that on no single parameter does the President score higher than 52 per cent. Yet he has an overall 75 per cent popularity rating. How? The disparity between 75 per cent and 52 per cent is far too wide to make research sense.
We are told, moreover, that 47 per cent of those polled believe that “the country is on the right footing.” Never mind the faulty sampling, to begin with. We must reflect about the reality on the ground, as captured in the daily press and public discourse. We must ask ourselves how that reality is reflected in the poll.
What is the state of the art? The shilling is in free fall. Yet we are told that the performance of the economy is one of the reasons for the President’s high rating. But we are also told that the three foremost challenges to the respondents are the cost of living, corruption and unemployment. I don’t know how you could possibly extricate these three from the economy.
How do you say, “I am troubled by the cost of living, corruption and unemployment” and the same mouth says, “I am happy that the economy is doing very well?” Forty-one per cent of those polled reported that the household economy had worsened. But, together with another six percent, they also went on to say that the country was headed in the right direction? How? It simply does not add up.
Consider this. The economy is doing very well. The country is headed in the right direction. However, 40,000 public servants are going to be retrenched. Even private companies are retrenching. The cost of fuel has crossed the 100-shilling mark. The cost of everything else has gone up as a result. Teachers are on strike and this has been on the cards from the start of the year. Nurses were on strike at the time of the survey. Some doctors, too. The only cancer equipment at Kenyatta National Hospital was down. But all this shows that the country is headed in the right direction.
Fears about terrorists remain. Quarrels within the political family are at an all time high. Worries about the International Criminal Court and the destiny of the Deputy President and the country have taken a worrying angle. Fifty-two per cent of those polled report that their families don’t have food. Corruption in devolved government has matured. The sugar sector has virtually collapsed. Kenya Airways teeters on the brink of collapse. Yet, the poll reveals, “The country is headed in the right direction.”
Either Kenyans are pain loving, or they don’t know what they want. Or maybe they are just not to be taken seriously on issues that directly affect them? More significantly, I think, the pollster has used unreliable methods and instruments. He has ignored critical demographics and has also framed his questions poorly.
Ipsos’ conclusions are misleading. They lack useful functional social meaning and value. The pollster might want to remember that he has an intelligent audience. I refrain from imputing improper motive on his part. And I trust that I am right. However, he will give himself that reputation, even without anybody’s imputation of anything.
