The recent Ipsos poll that points to a tight race between the two leading presidential candidates is glaringly mischievous and is yet another erratic journey to veer Kenyans off their frustrations with the Jubilee regime.
That a people can be fed up with their governance apparatus but still belabour to retain that very core element of misrule is an insult to their intelligence. Without dwelling on the contents thereof, it is foolhardy to assume that the country’s disapproval rating of the government at 71 per cent is independent of the President.
When conducted properly, opinion polls reflect people’s feelings and are useful to political players and strategists as they prepare and move towards the election.
However, the case is outrightly inaccurate in Kenya to the extent that many people treat the polls like any other rumour. The pollsters could as well be suggesting that the science of public surveying is besieged, a falsehood.
As much as the payers of the piper ultimately call the tune, the tune has to be danceable to achieve its desired outcomes. The gusto portrayed in such polls only unveils the malice behind them.
A meaningful survey must not be self-contradictory and has to be free from obvious subjectivity, at least if it is scientific, otherwise it makes a mockery of its intentions.
Without suggesting that political strategists should give up on public surveys, what we have witnessed in the recent past is not only abusive to the science behind polls, but to the intelligence of Kenyans.
If this trend continues unabated then every political grouping will resort to employing unprofessional methods to suit its interests.
Even if Kenyans were so naive as pollsters connote, how possible would it be that the Deputy President is classified as a presidential candidate and that he attracts public confidence at 31 per cent?
Why were other non-presidential contenders not included? Kenyans need to avoid putting any stock on pollsters as they are just another propaganda factory.
The postulation that forcing figures on Kenyans’ minds through dummy polls will repair the government’s tainted image remains delusional.
Key social and economic determinants of government’s approval are bare for all to see. The Ipsos poll may have overlooked the need not to include the criticism as regards displeasure with the direction the country is headed, but this could have accorded it some relevance.
Indeed, opinion polling will not replace other techniques that aid accurate gauging of public sentiments that build political support or opposition.
It is then cardinal that political formations with interest to reckon their popularity before general elections avoid the temptation of being swayed by influenced polls.
The tragedy is that such influenced polls tend to attract massive media attention, even as Kenyans remain ethnicised and less likely to be swayed anyway.
The foremost fact is that Kenyans are generally political and are not clueless about the direction the country is headed. Any endeavour to massage the egos of the powers that be is but self-serving.