Malawi in wrong direction under Mutharika -Survey: State House says not true reflection
The Institute of Public Opinion and Research (Ipor) conducted a survey led by Boniface Dulani, a University of Malawi academic and Afrobarometer representative, which shows that there are low levels of trust ratings for President Peter Mutharika and his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP ).
Dulani made his presentation titled ‘Democratic Governance and People’s Assessments of President Peter Mutharika’s One Year in Office’ at a meeting in Salima on Monday organised to assess Mutharika’s 12-month-long rule.
The survey was conducted in Rumphi, Salima and Thyolo districts and shows Mutharika has a high approval rating of 59 percent, but draw little trust from Malawians.
According to Dulani, Malawians “have passed their judgement—and that judgement is mostly negative.”
“The general picture from the survey is one of negativity. Seven in 10, thus 70 percent, of respondents from the three districts, say the country is going in the wrong direction,” said Dulani.
The findings show Malawians are proud of decisions effected by the Mutharika administration such as appointing and maintaining a lean Cabinet, prosecution of Cashgate cases, embarking on a public sector reform drive, no cases of political detentions, allowing public demonstrations without hindrance with traditional indices of governance suggesting Malawi has not regressed.
But concerns were raised on the liberalisation of the public media usch as MBC, Mana and no major progress on promises to trim presidential powers, lack of leadership on critical issues such as salaries, State-owned Malawi Savings Bank (MSB) sale and “focus on trivia”, among others.
Dulani said it might be too early to pass judgement on the Mutharika presidency from a democracy and governance perspective after only a year in office but said it was still important to acknowledge that there have been a few promising signs, but some not-so-promising ones as well.
In general, 42 percent of Malawians in the sampled districts where 600 in all particiapted do not trust the President. There are also low levels of trust ratings for the President in Thyolo (39 percent) and Salima (39 percent), with lower performance approval ratings for him in Salima and Rumphi.
“Interestingly, Rumphi residents trust the President more than those of Thyolo and Salima,” said Dulani.
However, State House has trashed the survey as lacking true reflections on the ground.
Presidential adviser on civil society organisations Mavuto Bamusi said the performance ratings show that majority of Malawians, 59 percent, are happy with the performance of the President.
Bamusi who pointed out that the mistrust can be a result of where the country is coming from in terms of leadership, told the meeting that he will pass on all the observations to the President uncensored.
Mutharika and DPP ascended to power following their controversial victory in the May 20 2014 Tripartite Elections.
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Fulani is a DPP machinery. This survey is fake. That why he’s part of vindele
Well,I am not a statistician but most malawians are brutes when it comes to statistics,my fellow brutes are questioning a sample size of 600 people as very small to represent a population if 16 million,but what people must be asking is,how did they cone up with the sample size,epi-info? Was randomization done and other bias trimming exercises done? What was the P-value if any? They will tell you and thus where you can start making your conclusions of the research incredibility or credibility,you can’t judge a study out come by just looking at raw figures,a sample of 600 people can… Read more »
I am very conversant with the technicalities of the survey but I trust Afrobarometer and I would suggest APM and DPP should tread carefully on this. People have a tendency of wanting to hear what they want to hear and supporting blindly as if politics is football or netball. Dulani is well respected guy who doesnt want to cheat or advance his own agenda in his work.Take it r leave it but he has said.
I think the sample is too small to conclude the effect. Beside that the sampling was also done one particular cluster neglecting the other cluster in the sampled district. However the reflection is the same and results are correct.
Dr Dulani this is the type of survey that poorly depicts or downgrade Unima credibility, You can do more, how do you expect an illiterate man to understand that the country has taken poor direction due to the leadership, the issue is that APM is very quiet and the actions that the govt is doing will always make sense in long term plans, This is the reason why some economists say the current budget is poor and does not make any sense while IMF experts say the budget is good, Lets wait and see and use our heads with sober… Read more »
SOME IDIOTS ARE ASKING WHO CAN TURN AROUND THE POOR ECONOMY IN JUST ONE YEAR???? ARE YOU NOT THE SAME IDIOTS WHO QUESTIONED AMAYI THAT SHE HAD DONE NOTHING IN TWO YEARS? AMAYI FOUND OUR ECONOMY IN WORSE CONDITION THAN PETER…..
What kind of survey where one respondent represent 23333 which is 0.04% of people at 3 confined places. The results may not be the true represention on the ground. So to me this is null and void. Conduct another one which should have all controls in place. Here my comment might be biased without proper facts
What kind of survey where one respondent represent 23333 which is 0.04%. The results may not be the true represention on the ground. So to me this is null and void. Conduct another one which should have all controls in place. Here my comment might be biased without proper facts
What kind of survey where one respondent represent 2333 which is 0.04%. The results may not be the true represention on the ground. So to me this is null and void. Conduct another one which should have all controls in place. Here my comment might be biased without proper facts