TWENTY-EIGHT per cent of Kenyans support Cord to end impunity, faithfully implement devolution and ensure minority rights, according to a new poll that still ranks Jubilee as the most popular party.
Only two per cent support the President’s ruling party to end impunity.
The Ipsos poll indicates that 40 per cent support President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Jubilee because of development, with only 29 per cent supporting Cord for a similar reason.
The opposition Cord, led by former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, scores 7 per cent of Kenyans’ support to end the gap between the rich and the poor, 10 per cent to implement devolution and 5 per cent for faithful implementation of the constitution.
But only 3 per cent of Kenyans support Jubilee to end the gap between the rich and the poor, 8 per cent to implement devolution and 2 per cent to implement the constitution.
“Such contrasts may encourage analysts to re-think the widely held view that Kenyan politics is nothing but ethnic competition for power and the spoils that accrue to it,” Ipsos said as it released the poll yesterday.
The poll however indicates that the Jubilee Coalition remains the most popular at 45 per cent, compared to Cord’s 32 per cent.
The Cord brigade has been pushing to have at least 30 per cent of all public appointments reserved for marginalised communities and the devolution of more resources to the counties.
Raila has lately scaled up the opposition onslaught against Jubilee on corruption and blew the whistle on the alleged Eurobond scandal.
The poll, conducted November 7-19, also showed that 11 per cent of Kenyans support Jubilee for both peace and dynamic leadership.
In contrast, only 6 per cent of Kenyans support Cord for peace and another 10 per cent for dynamic leadership.
However, 10 per cent of Jubilee supporters said they supported the ruling coalition without any specific reason, while 6 per cent of Cord supporters also said the same.
The poll had a sample size of 2,058 and also indicated that 57 per cent of Jubilee supporters believe there is no political party that genuinely represents the interests of ordinary Kenyans.
This is compared to 42 per cent of Cord supporters who said no political party genuinely represents the interests of ordinary Kenyans.
Only 31 per cent of Jubilee supporters agreed there is a political party that genuinely represents the interests of Kenyans, compared to Cord’s 45 per cent.
The poll also indicates that a 34 per cent of Kenyans want Raila to retire from politics.
However, of these, 56 per cent are Jubilee supporters, with only 6 per cent of Cord supporters saying he should hang up his boots.
However, 67 per cent of Cord supporters want Raila to remain active in politics and run in the 2017 presidential race.
Twenty per cent of those who do not want Raila on the ballot say he would be a bad president, 9 per cent say if he wins he would not be allowed to take power, while 26 per cent claim another opposition leader would have a better chance.
