THERE WILL BE NO HUNG POLL
November 18, 2011 | By KNews | Filed Under Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom
Source - Kaieteur News
At a recent forum, two of the Presidential Candidates for this year’s General Elections were presented with the following scenario: “We are now at December 2 … the Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission has announced that no political party is a clear winner in the elections. The AFC is now in the position of kingmaker and has to join forces with one of the political parties to form the government. These political parties are the APNU and the PPP/C. Would you (the AFC) make a decision to go with APNU or with (the) PPP/C?”
That question should not have been allowed because it is based on an almost impossible situation. There is not going to be any scenario in which the Guyana Elections Commission would be unable to announce a clear winner.
And the reason for this is simple. A party does not need 50% of the votes to win the elections. Even if a party gains below 50% of the total votes cast, it can still be declared the winner of the elections so long as it gets the highest number of votes. The party with the greatest number of votes wins the Presidency and the right to form the government so there can be no situation in which there is a hung poll unless of course all the parties tie with the exact number of votes. There is a better chance of fifty persons simultaneously winning the lottery than that happening though.
So there is going to be a winner announced for the elections this year and based on a recent NACTA poll, the PPP seems destined for the Presidency. The recently conducted polls has a 95% confidence interval meaning that one can predict with a 95% accuracy that if the elections were held on the day the poll was taken, the PPP/C would win by a landslide.
NACTA has developed a reputation for the accuracy of its local polls but it has come under criticisms since the person behind these polls has not restrained himself from commenting on local politics and has thus opened himself to criticism about possible bias.
However, he does have a track record of accurately predicting the outcome of elections in Guyana and elsewhere and only in one instance overseas did he get it wrong.
The science of polling is quite developed and in fact even before the votes are counted, pollsters are able due to the use of exit polls to predict who will win the elections. This was clearly seen in the last American Presidential elections when the news networks were calling the winners of the various states even before all the votes were counted or declared.
What we have in Guyana is an opinion poll and not an exit poll. But this opinion poll gives as much an accurate gauge of how persons are likely to vote. It uses the principle that one can deduce from a representative segment of the population how the overall population is going to vote. The process has become so scientific that even from a small number of persons polled; generalizations can be made as to how millions of persons will vote.
The outcome of a poll, however, is an outcome at a specific time and there is the possibility that things can change but whether at this stage any of the opposition parties can make up the gap is doubtful.
It is understood that another poll is being conducted this weekend and the results of that poll should give a clearer picture of how the elections should unfold but based on the trends so far and on the assumption that the NACTA polls are scientifically done, then the PPP is on its way to landslide victory since it is 20 percentage points over its nearest rival APNU in the recent poll.
As much as that result would have been anticipated by the PPP/C, it must be something of a disappointment for them since they would have been hoping for a 60% take of the total votes cast which now seems impossible.
Based on the recent poll, if the elections were to have been held then the PPP could gain anywhere between 45-50% of the vote and APNU between 25 and 35% of the votes cast. This virtually assures the PPP of the presidency and the right to form the government but whether it will be sufficient to gain a majority in parliament depends on other factors as well including the actual results in the regional elections.
One of the fears of the PPP/C is that it will not gain a majority of the seats in the National Assembly. In this regard, its ability to rule can be paralyzed but it would still retain the Presidency. If it is unable to pass financial bills or laws, then it will find it difficult but not impossible to administer the affairs of the country and if a vote of no-confidence is passed in the administration, it would be forced to call fresh elections. As such the PPP/C has been keen to emphasize to its supporters the importance of every vote since it needs parliamentary majority.
Of course, apathy can upset these equations but the recent NACTA poll did ask people who they were voting for. The fact that answers were given would suggest that apathy is not going to be a major factor. And if apathy is indeed a factor it would tend to affect those parties without strong mobilization skills. The PPP is known for its ability to mobilize its supporters.
November 18, 2011 | By KNews | Filed Under Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom
Source - Kaieteur News
At a recent forum, two of the Presidential Candidates for this year’s General Elections were presented with the following scenario: “We are now at December 2 … the Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission has announced that no political party is a clear winner in the elections. The AFC is now in the position of kingmaker and has to join forces with one of the political parties to form the government. These political parties are the APNU and the PPP/C. Would you (the AFC) make a decision to go with APNU or with (the) PPP/C?”
That question should not have been allowed because it is based on an almost impossible situation. There is not going to be any scenario in which the Guyana Elections Commission would be unable to announce a clear winner.
And the reason for this is simple. A party does not need 50% of the votes to win the elections. Even if a party gains below 50% of the total votes cast, it can still be declared the winner of the elections so long as it gets the highest number of votes. The party with the greatest number of votes wins the Presidency and the right to form the government so there can be no situation in which there is a hung poll unless of course all the parties tie with the exact number of votes. There is a better chance of fifty persons simultaneously winning the lottery than that happening though.
So there is going to be a winner announced for the elections this year and based on a recent NACTA poll, the PPP seems destined for the Presidency. The recently conducted polls has a 95% confidence interval meaning that one can predict with a 95% accuracy that if the elections were held on the day the poll was taken, the PPP/C would win by a landslide.
NACTA has developed a reputation for the accuracy of its local polls but it has come under criticisms since the person behind these polls has not restrained himself from commenting on local politics and has thus opened himself to criticism about possible bias.
However, he does have a track record of accurately predicting the outcome of elections in Guyana and elsewhere and only in one instance overseas did he get it wrong.
The science of polling is quite developed and in fact even before the votes are counted, pollsters are able due to the use of exit polls to predict who will win the elections. This was clearly seen in the last American Presidential elections when the news networks were calling the winners of the various states even before all the votes were counted or declared.
What we have in Guyana is an opinion poll and not an exit poll. But this opinion poll gives as much an accurate gauge of how persons are likely to vote. It uses the principle that one can deduce from a representative segment of the population how the overall population is going to vote. The process has become so scientific that even from a small number of persons polled; generalizations can be made as to how millions of persons will vote.
The outcome of a poll, however, is an outcome at a specific time and there is the possibility that things can change but whether at this stage any of the opposition parties can make up the gap is doubtful.
It is understood that another poll is being conducted this weekend and the results of that poll should give a clearer picture of how the elections should unfold but based on the trends so far and on the assumption that the NACTA polls are scientifically done, then the PPP is on its way to landslide victory since it is 20 percentage points over its nearest rival APNU in the recent poll.
As much as that result would have been anticipated by the PPP/C, it must be something of a disappointment for them since they would have been hoping for a 60% take of the total votes cast which now seems impossible.
Based on the recent poll, if the elections were to have been held then the PPP could gain anywhere between 45-50% of the vote and APNU between 25 and 35% of the votes cast. This virtually assures the PPP of the presidency and the right to form the government but whether it will be sufficient to gain a majority in parliament depends on other factors as well including the actual results in the regional elections.
One of the fears of the PPP/C is that it will not gain a majority of the seats in the National Assembly. In this regard, its ability to rule can be paralyzed but it would still retain the Presidency. If it is unable to pass financial bills or laws, then it will find it difficult but not impossible to administer the affairs of the country and if a vote of no-confidence is passed in the administration, it would be forced to call fresh elections. As such the PPP/C has been keen to emphasize to its supporters the importance of every vote since it needs parliamentary majority.
Of course, apathy can upset these equations but the recent NACTA poll did ask people who they were voting for. The fact that answers were given would suggest that apathy is not going to be a major factor. And if apathy is indeed a factor it would tend to affect those parties without strong mobilization skills. The PPP is known for its ability to mobilize its supporters.
