President Akufo-Addo has revealed that he will not be complacent over result from opinion polls released by the Political Science Department of the University of Ghana which projected a win for the New Patriotic Party.
The survey which raked for the incumbent government a staggering 57.1% from a sampled respondents of about eleven thousand, was an encouraging feat for the president, however, he insists he remains focused on continuing with his campaigns.
Speaking in an interview, President Akufo-Addo said the party will be tirelessly assiduous in their endeavor at winning the December 7 election.
“Opinion polls are just opinion polls, and [they] are votes. Even Though I am encouraged, I am not going to be complacent about it and lose my guard on campaigning. Right up to the midnight of December 5 that the laws allow us to campaign, we will continue to campaign for every single vote in the country and make sure it is ours so on the 7th of December 2020, we will be declared winners of the polls.
“Even though I am not going to ignore the polls completely but my focus isn’t on it. After the elections, we will all know if the polls are right after the polls, and I am declared the winner.”
The research conducted by the Political Science Department of the University of Ghana indicated that the New Patriotic Party (NPP) is likely to win the upcoming presidential election in December.
The research spanned 100 constituencies purposively selected across all 16 regions with 11,949 respondents out of a targeted 12,000 in a random sampling manner.
According to the survey, 51.7% of respondents said they will vote for the incumbent President Akufo-Addo while 40.4% opted for the flagbearer of the National Democratic Congress (NDC) John Mahama.
The candidate of the Ghana Union Movement (GUM), Christian Kwabena Andrews, placed third in the survey with 1.4 percent.
The survey which was carried out from 12-22 November, 2020, was presented by Kaakyire Duku Frempong, a lead researcher on the project.
Meanwhile, the National Democratic Congress (NDC) has slammed the findings from the survey.
Addressing a press conference, the National Communications Officer of the party, Sammy Gyamfi, questioned the credibility of the lecturers involved in the survey.
“Some few people were influenced by NPP politicians. They sat in the confines of their offices and generated a report which is what has been released. That is the information we have”.
He further revealed that, the results contained in the survey cannot necessarily reflect the actual outcome of the elections.
“Assuming without admitting that this poll was authentic and well done, it’s just a poll. Even if what they have done is a good research job, it doesn’t necessarily mean it will come to pass because polls are not sacrosanct.”
