Survey: 52% of Ugandans want 2021 general election postponed

At least 52% of Ugandans are in favour of postponing the forthcoming 2021 general election instead of holding a 'scientific' election, a new survey has revealed.

The Electoral Commission (EC) issued a new electoral roadmap last month, which suggested that candidates for the 2021 general election will hold campaigns 'scientifically' on TV, Radio and online, something that sparked off a debate online as several politicians disagreed with the idea.

In a public opinion survey done by Whitehead Communications, a public relations firm, between the 6th and 15th of July, majority of the respondents  do not agree with the idea of the scientific elections either.

The respondents to the survey were asked on how much do they approve of the Government of Uganda's plan to hold a 'scientific' election with options to strongly approve, approve, neither approve or disapprove, disapprove, strongly disapprove or indicate that they don't understand.

In the responses, only 6% strongly approved EC's plan, 10% approve, 12% neither approve nor disapprove / not sure, 20% disapprove and 44% strongly disapprove the idea of a scientific election.

Strong disapproval was in the areas of Kampala, Mukono and Wakiso (49%) than upcountry (34%). 9% of the respondents did not know what a 'scientific election' means.

On postponing the election

The majority of the respondents (52%) think that the next Ugandan election should be postponed. Only 43% of the respondents believe that the Government should hold the election as scheduled.

5% of the respondents selected "other" and provided responses which included among others; don't know or don't care, hold a normal, non scientific election, monitor the Covid-19 situation and decide later if elections are safe, elections are illegitimate and therefore useless and a waste of time.

Sample space and methodology

Whitehead Communications interviewed 1,353 respondents from the main geographical parts of the country.

Of these, 66% (777)  where from Kampala, 7% (78) where from the Central parts of Uganda other than Kampala, Wakiso or Mukono, 10% (121) where from Eastern Uganda, 7% (84) where from Northern Uganda, 11% (126) where from Western Uganda while those from outside Uganda were removed after data cleaning.

64% (752) were males, 36% (427)were females while 0.5% (6) chose other or preferred not to say.

Whitehead Communications used a mixed methodology in collecting results from both online and through phone calls. Data was later cleansed to improve the research.

Whitehead Communications as a firm, has mastered the art of providing value based public relations services with integrity, honesty and professionalism. They work with various organizations and creative teams in Canada, Uganda and across the globe to build collaborations between people.

More on this survey will be published on Tuesday, July 21,2020...