Abuja, Nigeria. October 13th, 2015 – Latest poll results released by NOIPolls have revealed that following the recent release of the Ministerial list by President Muhammadu Buhari, almost 7 in 10 Nigerians (68 percent) are pleased with all the nominees, although with varying degrees per nominee. In this regard, former state governors, Babatunde Raji Fashola SAN (44 percent), Rotimi Amaechi (31 percent), and Chris Ngige (25 percent); as well as past senator Aisha Alhassan topped the list of Ministerial nominees most appealing to Nigerians, while Hadi Sirika a former Senator (14 percent), Ibrahim Usman Jubrin a former military governor (14 percent) were least mentioned in this category.
Nominees were also assessed based on familiarity (awareness of the nominee to the general public), as well as their net favourability position (the overall public perception of the candidate which is derived through positive opinions minus negative opinions). In this light, Babatunde Raji Fashola had the highest familiarity (90 percent) as well as net favourability (+61) among all 21 nominees. Similarly, Rotimi Ameachi had a high familiarity (89 percent) compared with Chris Ngige (77 percent) and Kayode Fayemi (71 percent), however they both have higher net favourability (+40 and +45 respectively) compared to Amaechi who had a lower net favourability of +30.
Furthermore as Nigerians await the release of the second list, some respondents (6 percent) indicated Prof Pat Utomi a professor at Lagos Business School, Femi Falana (SAN) a human rights activist and lawyer in Nigeria (4 percent), Charles Soludo past Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (3 percent), Rabiu Kwankwaso a former state governor (3 percent) and Oby Ezekwesili a former minister of Education (2 percent) as possible recommendations for any subsequent Ministerial lists.
Still on governance, recent approval ratings conducted by NOIPolls for the President at the end of September 2015 revealed that the President’s job performance rating for the month of September 2015 increased by 1-point to stand at 78 percent. It is worth noting that the general increase in his job approval in September 2015 was observed across only 4 geo-political zones (North-Central, North-East, North-West, South-West) with the North-East zone (94 percent) recording the largest number of respondents who approved of the president’s job performance. The positive approval rating of President Buhari is mostly based on the perceived ‘improved security’ (21 percent), ‘improved power supply’ (19 percent) and his ‘campaign against corruption’ (11 percent) across the country amongst other reasons.
Brief background
Nigerians had long-awaited President Muhammadu Buhari’s Ministerial list and it has finally been made public by the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, on the floor of the senate on the 6th of October 2015.
Though the nominees were a mixture of old politicians, retired military men, immediate past governors, technocrats and former political appointees, the announcement of the 21 Ministerial nominees appeared to have increased the controversies as the polity was suffused with claims, counter-claims and controversies over the necessity or otherwise of the delay. Conceivably, the reactions about the list vary from people to people and also in accordance with their political interest and belief.[1]
Against this background, NOIPolls conducted a recent survey to ascertain the awareness of Nigerians on the recently released Ministerial list and also measure their awareness and perception on all 21 nominees, as well as possible recommendation for subsequent Ministerial list.
Survey Findings
The awareness of the recently released Ministerial list was measured and findings revealed that most Nigerians (80 percent) are aware of the release of the list. This news would not have gone unnoticed, considering the fact that there was a wait for about 4 months for this exercise.
Respondents who showed awareness of the Ministerial list (80 percent of the total) were further asked what names on the list appealed to them the most. Respondents were allowed to list as many names on the list that appealed to them as possible. Responses placed Babatunde Raji Fashola SAN (44 percent), who was the former Lagos State Governor from May 29, 2007 to May 29, 2015, as the nominee most appealing to Nigerians. This is followed by Rotimi Amaechi (31 percent), who served as the 5th Governor of Rivers State from 2007 to 2015.
Other top names on the list that appealed to Nigerians include Aisha Alhassan (25 percent), a past Senator; Chris Ngige (25 percent), a former governor of Anambra State; Audu Ogbeh a past chairman of the People’s Democratic Party from 2001 until January 2005 (22 percent); and Abdulrahaman Danbazzau (21 percent), a retired Nigerian Army Lieutenant General.
While all 21 names of nominees were mentioned, some names were least mentioned and these include Hadi Sirika, a former pilot and Senator (14 percent) and Ibrahim Usman Jubrin a former Military Governor (14 percent). In addition, a considerable proportion of respondents (23 percent) reported that no name on the list appeals to them.
In the same manner, respondents were asked what names on the Ministerial list did not appeal to them and findings revealed that majority (68 percent) of the respondents did not mention any name that did not appeal to them. This therefore implies that most Nigerians endorse the Ministerial list, although 20 percent of the respondents indicated Rotimi Ameachi’s as a name that did not appeal to them on the list. This is followed by Babatunde Raji Fashola (9 percent), Chris Nigige (9 percent) and Audu Ogbeh (8 percent) amongst others.
The poll also measured the ‘Familiarity’ and ‘Favourability’ of the Ministerial nominees. Familiarity of nominees assessed the general public awareness of the nominees. Similarly, favourability measured the overall perception of respondents towards the nominees, through positive and negative opinions of the respondents towards the nominees. The perception of the respondents towards the nominees is presented as Net Favourability of the nominees; derived by positive opinions minus negative opinions.
Findings are presented in a 4 X 4 matrix which shows the familiarity alongside the net favourability of each Ministerial nominee as shown in the figure below.
The four quadrants are interpreted as follows:
The top right quadrant implies a high familiarity and positive net favourability. Nominees that fall in this quadrant are well known and well liked.
The top left quadrant implies low familiarity and positive favourability. Nominees in this quadrant have a positive net favourability but are not well known. They are only known by a few people but those few have very high opinions of them.
The bottom left quadrant implies low familiarity and negative favourability. Nominees that fall in this quadrant are not well known and also have a negative public image.
The bottom right quadrant implies high familiarity and negative net favourability. Nominees that fall in this category are well known, however they have a negative public image.
Based on the interpretation of the matrix, findings revealed that all the nominees have positive favourability, thus indicating positive public opinion given the fact that no name appeared in the bottom left quadrant. The matrix also reveals a clustering of nominees in the top left quadrant indicating that these Nominees have a positive net favourability but are not well known. Thus they have relatively the same level of favourability and familiarity with minimal differences. Nominees in this category include Abubakar Malami (SAN), Kemi Adeosun and Ahmed Ibeto amongst others.
Some names of nominees stood out in the top right quadrant indicating a high level of familiarity as well as favourability. For instance, Babatunde Raji Fashola which appears at the top right of the matrix is an indication that among all the nominees he has the highest familiarity (90 percent) as well as net favourability (+61). Similarly, while Rotimi Ameachi has a higher familiarity (89 percent) compared with Chris Ngige and Kayode Fayemi, they both have a higher favourability compared with Rotimi Amaechi as seen in the table below. A striking similarity amongst nominees in the top right quadrant who have the highest familiarity and favourability is that these are past executives.
Ministerianl Nominees
Nationwide
% Familiarity
% With
Favourable
(Positive)
opinion
% With
Unfavourable
(Negative)
opinion
Net
Favourability
Babatunde Raji Fashola
90
71
10
+61
Kayode Fayemi
71
53
8
+45
Chris Ngige
77
52
12
+40
Aisha Alhassan
58
44
7
+37
Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu
56
40
5
+35
Solomon Dalong
56
40
5
+35
Ogbonnaya Onu
59
41
7
+34
Udo Udoma
53
37
5
+32
Rotimi Amaechi
89
54
24
+30
Lai Mohammed
62
40
10
+30
Amina Mohammed
51
35
6
+29
Abubakar Malami (SAN)
48
33
5
+28
Audu Ogbe
65
41
13
+28
Kemi Adeosun
49
33
6
+27
Ahmed Ibeto
47
32
5
+27
Abdulrahama Danbazzau
50
33
7
+26
Adebayo Shittu
47
30
5
+25
Ibrahim Usman Jubrin
48
31
6
+25
Suleiman Adamu
44
29
4
+25
Osagie Ehaneri
46
29
6
+23
Hadi Sirika
42
26
6
+20
Finally on this poll, respondents were asked what names they would like to see for possible recommendation in the subsequent Ministerial list. Findings revealed that on the one hand, about half (52 percent) of the respondents who showed awareness of the recently released Ministerial list, are just satisfied with the names on the list such that they have no recommendation for subsequent Ministerial list.
On the other hand, some respondents (6 percent) indicated Prof Pat Utomi a professor at Lagos Business School, as a possible recommendation for subsequent Ministerial list. This is followed by Femi Falana (SAN) a human rights activist and lawyer in Nigeria (4 percent), Charles Soludo a former Governor of the Central Bank (3 percent), Rabiu Kwankwaso a former Governor of Kano state (3 percent) and Oby Ezekwesili (2 percent). See Table after conclusion for other names mentioned in the survey.
Still on governance, NOIPolls conducted the fourth approval rating for President Muhammadu Buhari’s job performance and the ninth in the 2015 monthly series of governance polls, to gauge the opinions and perceptions of Nigerians regarding the approval rating of the President. Findings revealed that a larger proportion of Nigerians (78 percent) approved of the President’s job performance over the past one month. On the other hand, 11 percent of the respondents disapproved of the President Buhari’s job performance, while another 11 percent of Nigerians neither approved nor disapproved of the President’s job performance over the past one month.
Further evaluation of the President’s performance by geo-political zone revealed that the North-East zone (94 percent: 65 percent + 29 percent) and the North-West zone (90 percent: 57 percent + 33 percent) accounted for the larger proportion of Nigerians who approved of President Buhari’s job performance, hence impacting the overall increase of the President’s rating in September 2015. Conversely, the South-East zone (29 percent: 25 percent + 4 percent) and the South-South zone (22 percent: 18 percent + 4 percent) accounted for the largest ratio of respondents who disapproved of the President’s job performance.
Subsequently, respondents were asked to state the reasons for approving or disapproving the President’s performance. The result revealed that ‘Improved security’ (21 percent) topped the lists of reasons for approving the President’s job performance in September 2015. Other reasons on the list includes ‘improved power supply’ (19 percent) and ‘campaign against corruption’ (11 percent) amongst other reasons given by Nigerians. Conversely, Nigerians who disapproved the President’s job performance specifying that ‘there ‘hasn’t been any feasible changes in governance’ (65 percent) and ‘delay in appointing ministers’ (16 percent) among others reasons.
Conclusion
Following the recent release of the Ministerial list, Nigerians (68 percent) have shown some support for the nominees; with Babatunde Raji Fashola SAN (44 percent), a former Lagos State Governor, Rotimi Amaechi (31 percent), former state Governor of Rivers State. Aisha Alhassan a former Senator representing Taraba North constituency of Taraba State, and Chris Ngige former state governor of Anambra State (25 percent) topping the list as names most appealing to Nigerians. As Nigerians await the release of the second list some respondents indicated Prof Pat Utomi (6 percent), Femi Falana (SAN) (4 percent), Charles Soludo (3 percent), Rabiu Kwankwaso (3 percent) and Oby Ezekwesili (2 percent) as possible recommendations for subsequent Ministerial list. Finally, while Nigerians endorse the Ministerial nominees, the fate of these nominees will be determined by the final outcome of the screening process by the senate, commencing on the same date as this release (Tuesday 13th October 2015).
Table: Other Names Listed by Nigerians for Subsequent Ministerial List
S/N
Names
%
S/N
Names
%
S/N
Names
%
S/N
Names
%
1
Aisha Dimani Adamawa
1
36
Jim Ovia
0
71
Onyemuche Nnamani
0
106
David Uwais Sam
0
2
Abike Dabiri
1
37
Chief Eze Duruiheamo
0
72
Okechukwu Osita
0
107
Mike Oshobuge
0
3
Ahmed Ali Kaduna
1
38
Ahmed Tinubu
0
73
Faruku Adamu Aliyu
0
108
Frank Nweke Junior
0
4
Adams Oshiomhole
1
39
Abba Moro
0
74
Goodluck Jonathan
0
109
Gorge Akume
0
5
Abdulrazak Namdas
1
40
Mr. Shekarau
0
75
Jubril Aminu
0
110
Prof Michael Adiku Vc Uni
0
6
Ahmed Aboki
1
41
Abubakar Tsav
0
76
Ibrahim Tappa
0
111
Zayyanu Mohammed Na Allah
0
7
Aisha Gidado
1
42
Ahmed Umaru Fintiri
0
77
Buba Maruwa
0
112
Ibrahim Umar Aniyeiye
0
8
Adesina Akinwunmi
1
43
Abubukar Gada
0
78
Bomi Haruna
0
113
Maniru Mohammed
0
9
Alao Akala
1
44
Abdullahim Idde
0
79
Muhammadu Megar
0
114
Bello Suleiman – Sokoto
0
10
Dele Momodu
1
45
Abdulhasis Yar’dar
0
80
Usman Sa’idu Nasamu Dakin
0
115
Balarabe Musa
0
11
Pastor Tunde Bakare
1
46
Aisha Dinami
0
81
Buhari Bala – Kebbi
0
116
Proffessor Ango Abdullahi
0
12
Steve Torkuma Ugbah
1
47
Adeyemi Kufiriji
0
82
Dr Ibrahim .M.
0
117
Saidu Dakingari
0
13
Atahiru Jega
1
48
Ahmed Markarfi
0
83
Hajiya Ladahatu
0
118
Suleiman Adebayo – Ogun Sta
0
14
Buhari Bello
1
49
Alozie Leah Nwadinma
0
84
Malam Sani Aliyu
0
119
Uche Ogocha – Imo Senator
0
15
Festus Odimegwu
1
50
Lola Shoneyin
0
85
Mataima Sule – Kano
0
120
Aleiro – Former Fct Minister
0
16
Donald Duke
1
51
Olagunsoye Oyinlola
0
86
Mukthar Babayo
0
121
Faruk Adamu Aliyu – Jigawa State
0
17
Rochas Okorocha
1
52
Chief Olorunfunmi Bashorun
0
87
Fintiri -Ex Adamawa Speaker
0
122
Victor Attah – Akwa Ibom State
0
18
Yusfu Mataima Tuga -Bauchi
1
53
Ademola Adeniji Adele
0
88
Danjuma Goje
0
123
Sullivan Iheanacho
0
19
Bamaga Tukur
1
54
Taofeek Kashimawo
0
89
Aisha Jimani
0
124
Prof Chris Okoroafor
0
20
Mutarla Nyako
1
55
Jafaru Isa – Kano State
0
90
Festus Keyamo
0
125
Suleiman Abba.
0
21
Peter Obi
1
56
Timi Alaibe
0
91
Bar. David Ocholi
0
126
Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau
0
22
Balarabe Musa
1
57
Peremobowei Ebebi
0
92
John Oyegun
0
127
Uyi Edgbe
0
23
Ibrahim Umar – Kebbi State)
1
58
Pro Bolaji Akinyemi
0
93
Barth Nnaji
0
128
Daniel Edebri
0
24
Nmamdina Abdulraham
1
59
Chimaroke Nnamani
0
94
Segun Oni
0
129
Mike Onlememen
0
25
Justice Magomega
1
60
Baba Nwanna
0
95
Rt Col. Abubakar Umar
0
130
Prof. Osugbo
0
26
Zakari Salihu
1
61
Chief Okey Ezea(Ideke)
0
96
Prof Isaac Adewole
0
131
Mr Solomon Ogba
0
27
Babangida Aliyu
1
62
Kolade Christopher Sure-P
0
97
Anyim Pius Anyim
0
132
Rev. Olu Martins
0
28
Sullivan Chime
1
63
James Bala Nglari
0
98
Dakuku Peterside
0
133
Fani Kayode
0
29
Babatunde Fashola
1
64
Buba Galadima
0
99
Mohammed Marazu Tsiga
0
134
Emmanuel Jime
0
30
Nasir El-Rufai
1
65
Attihiru Bafarawa
0
100
Prof. J.D Amin
0
135
Mrs Lawrencia Laraba-Mallam
0
31
Nana Dawodu
0
66
Saidu Nasumu Dargri
0
101
Shaibu Mugadi Dan Jarida
0
0
32
Professor Daniel Saror
0
67
Aliyu Wammako
0
102
Ibrahim Birnin Gfada
0
0
33
Dr Paul Unongo
0
68
Boss Mustapha
0
103
Wole Soyinka
0
34
Alhaji Ahmed Rufai Sani Yerima
0
69
Sani Aliyu Zuru
0
104
Labara Maku
0
35
Nuhu Ribadu
0
70
Ankpai Daniel
0
105
Tam David West
0
Survey Methods
The opinion poll was conducted in the week of October 5th 2015. It involved telephone interviews of a random nationwide sample. 1,000 randomly selected phone-owning Nigerians aged 18 years and above, representing the six geopolitical zones in the country, were interviewed. With a sample of this size, we can say with 95% confidence that the results obtained are statistically precise – within a range of plus or minus 3%. NOIPolls Limited is No1 for country specific polling services in West Africa. We conduct periodic opinion polls and studies on various socio-economic and political issues in Nigeria. More information is available at www.noi-polls.com
Disclaimer
This press release has been produced by NOIPolls Limited to provide information on all issues which form the subject matter of the document. Kindly note that while we are willing to share results from our polls with the general public, we only request that NOIPolls be acknowledged as author whenever and wherever our poll results are used, cited or published.
NOIPolls hereby certifies that all the views expressed in this document accurately reflect its views of respondents surveyed for the poll, and background information is based on information from various sources that it believes are reliable; however, no representation is made that it is accurate or complete. Whilst reasonable care has been taken in preparing this document, no responsibility or liability is accepted for errors or fact or for any views expressed herein by NOIPolls for actions taken as a result of information provided in this report. Any ratings, forecasts, estimates, opinions or views herein constitute a judgment as at the date of this document. If the date of this document is not current, the views and content may not reflect NOIPolls’ current findings and/or thinking.
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Email: editor@noi-polls.com
[1] http://www.punchng.com/news/protests-as-saraki-unveils-buharis-ministerial-list/