President Goodluck Jonathan has taken quite a few knocks. That is the unalloyed truth; Boko Haram; the Chibok girls abduction; an unenviable record as the first President in Nigeria to be dubbed “clueless,” and a tendency to be unbelievably patient in the face of extreme provocation by supposed friends and foes alike. None of these things have served him well in recent times.
Despite all that, in the run-up to the 2015 Presidential Election, Jonathan’s now legendary luck is taking a turn for the better. The notorious Boko Haram has surprisingly agreed to a ceasefire with the possibility of the Chibok girls being released. And the leading All Progressives Congress presidential aspirant, General Muhammadu Buhari, has committed a faux pas of monumental proportions by claiming to have taken a loan to acquire APC’s N27.5 million nomination form. And then the NOI Polls has recently released the fifth series of its Candidacy Viability Report with Jonathan leading the pack of presidential hopefuls. It is inevitable that even Jonathan’s detractors would ask: just how lucky can this man named Goodluck get?
Regarding the NOI Polls, Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola, himself a leading light of the APC, is reported to be the second most viable potential presidential candidate even though the man is not on record as having ever indicated interest in the country’s number one job. Another APC leading light, Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State, is positioned by the NOI Polls as the third most viable potential presidential candidate.
Okorocha, who has aspired to be president before, may or may not contest the APC presidential primaries. However, one man who is certain to contest, former military dictator Buhari, is fourth on the list of 17 potential presidential candidates, which include absolute no-hopers like soft-sell journalist Dele Momodu and bombastic clergyman Chris Okotie.
While the space of a brief newspaper article is hardly enough to analyse the NOI Polls Candidacy Viability Report in detail, it is important to draw attention to a few key factors. Chief among these are the demographic distribution of those polled and the methodology employed.
The report states that exactly 1,000 respondents were interviewed by telephone for the poll. 51% of the respondents were male while 49% were females. According to the report, “Most respondents were aged between 30 and 45 years (55%), followed by 31% that were aged between 22 and 29 years.
“In addition, the larger share of respondents reside in the North-West (24%) followed by 20% in the South-West and 15% in each of the North-Central and South-South zones. Also, the greater proportion are self-employed traders (28%) followed by government workers (20%) and students (14%).” To determine the viability of a candidate during an election, two factors were used. These are: “(1) Voters must be familiar with the candidate and; (2) Have an overall positive impression of the candidate.”
In order to present the most important findings of the poll in context, it is necessary to quote Section 4.1 of the report, which is the part tagged “Favourability and Familiarity Scores of Potential Candidates.” The relevant portion of the section reads: “President Goodluck Jonathan of the PDP currently has the best candidate viability among all potential candidates for the 2015 Presidential Elections because of his high familiarity score (99%) and high net favourability (+25).
“Furthermore, Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State currently has the best candidate viability among potential APC candidates for the 2015 Presidential elections due to his high familiarity score (94%) and positive net favourability (+8). The only other candidate that falls in the right upper quadrant with the two aforementioned is Governor Rochas Okorocha of Imo State and similarly of the APC with a familiarity score of 88% and net favourability of 0.
“Another potential APC flag bearer is former military Head of State; Retired Major General Muhammadu Buhari. Survey results show that though he is well known (96%) he has a slightly negative favourability rating (-2). Other APC members with slightly negative favourability in spite of their high familiarity include Governor Adams Oshiomole of Edo State (-5) and Governor Rabiu Kwankwaso of Kano State (-7).”
Of course, it should be said that those who may which to can download the full report from the NOI Polls website in order to peruse the document for themselves.
Interestingly, on the day that NOI Polls released the report, Vanguard columnist Femi Aribisala turned the tables and flung a tag that was exclusively Jonathan’s in the opposite direction. In a piece titled “Muhammadu Buhari: Running for President with an Anti-Corruption Bank Loan,” Aribisala concluded: “Buhari wants to fight an election that will take place in four months’ time. From what he tells us, he does not have N27.5 million to prosecute that election now. If this is true, he is not the right man to be president of Nigeria. For a man who is running for election for the fourth time, that is the height of cluelessness. It shows Buhari is lousy at marshalling resources. Otherwise, he is fooling nobody but himself.”
Suddenly, somebody other than Jonathan has been dubbed “clueless”. If that is not an indication of a resurgent Jonathan, then this writer would like to know what it is.
Mr Ezendiaru contributed this piece from Owerri, Imo State.
