Nana Addo, Nduom top choices among likely voters in new internet poll
A new internet poll released recently has revealed to Ghanaians and democracy watchers how voting patterns for the upcoming election would look like. With nine months to go until the 2008 general elections, the latest Ghana Elections 2008 Polls Group Internet survey has placed the New Patriotic Party's Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo in a commanding lead at 39.3% among likely voters.
The survey was conducted by the Ghana Elections '08 Polls was compiled through an internet survey tool from January-March 28, 2008. Generally, the survey was popularized among internet users worldwide where a Ghanaian community was deemed to congregate
Poll results show Paa Kwesi Nduom, candidate of the Convention Peoples Party at second position with 30.8%.
Nana Akufo-Addo was a little less than ten percentage points ahead of the National Democratic Congress's John Evans Atta Mills, who had 29.9%. An independent candidate, Kwesi Amoafo Yeboah got 0.9% of the vote, ahead of Edward Mahama of the People's National Convention who got no vote.
93.7 percent of respondents for the polls were Ghanaian citizens, whiles 71.8 percent were registered to vote in Ghana. Only 28.2 percent were neither.
Among likely voters, 70.9% were male whiles females accounted for 29.1%, showing a low interest in politics by women in general. However, those who took the survey seemed to be closely following politics in Ghana—a good sign for participatory democracy in the country.
There was a response rate of 91.2%, among a total of 114 people surveyed. 79.4% of voters from the CPP were Most Satisfied with their candidate when asked the question: Do you think the CPP (and other parties as the case may be) elected the right candidate. 67.3% said the NPP elected the right candidate while NDC voters were the most dissatisfied with their candidate, with only 42.2% thinking John Evans Atta Mills was the right choice. Last year the former Vice President beat Ekow Spio Garbrah by a wide margin in the NDC flag bearer race.
While the responses show how people would have voted if they had the chance to vote in the December elections, it is by no means generalisable in toto since the survey was mostly limited to those who had access to computers.
It could however give a clear indication of voting pattern among the educated, working class, students and elites in Ghana—a demographic group who are hard to convince and where candidates should be looking to in order to convince a considerable number of independents.
Also, even though Ghanaians seem to be generally interested in the political development of their country very few were registered party members. 9.6% of respondents said they were members of a registered party while 90.4% said they hadn't registered with any political party.
This is indicative of a large number of floating voters who can swing the election any way, though many who profess to be NPP and NDC members have not registered with any of these parties.
64.4% of respondents said they were more likely to vote on issues and policies than the quality of a candidate (43.3%) or party affiliation (2.9%). If this is anything to go by the party's should prepare for a long haul of policy debates especially from the country's literate population instead of expecting people to vote en masse, the authors of the survey wrote. Education, poverty, unemployment, the economy and national security seemed to feature most when voters were asked what they wanted to hear candidates talk about.
Social Networking Sites such as facebook and hi5 have become popular new media trends (Levy & Stone, 2006) and have been accepted by researchers and the academic community as part of modern mass communication methods. Internet usage in particular has gradually increased since 1990s allowing researchers to gain access to huge numbers of people at cheaper cost. (Pew research Foundation 1998, 2000). The concept of social networking is built on the idea/theory of social capital which is based on reciprocity transactions(Frank & Yasumoto,1998), behavior influence and social control, promotion of participatory democracy and the boosting of a candidate's image.(Farqular,2008) .
This survey was primarily posted but not limited to users of Facebook, the popular social networking site and has been up since January 2008. The sample also included users of hi5, another popular social networking site among Ghanaians living in and outside the country.
Of the total number of respondents polled 49.5% live in Ghana, 0.9% in another African country and 48% said they lived in a country not in Africa.
The Ghana Elections '08 polls Group is an initiative which provides the most up to date results on voter preferences and the public's feelings and attitudes towards candidates and the political processes in the country. This is done through frequent surveys utilising innovative techniques.
The Group uses empirical methods to evaluate the study and report on the public perception of the candidates in the upcoming elections. Survey answers are anonymous. This initiative is independent, non-partisan, and invites participation from all interested persons.
It is made up of Etse Sikanku, Graduate student, Journalism and Mass Communication, Iowa State University, Basil Mahayni, Political Science, Iowa State University ('07), Karin Brandt, Iowa State University ('07), Atsu Sikanku, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology ('06) and Delali Dei, University of Brighton, UK.