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By Nakinskie Robinson
There's a strong showing among potential voters in favour of the opposition People's National Party (PNP), which now has a near 8 per cent lead over the ruling Jamaica Labour Party (JLP).
This surge by the PNP was revealed in the latest Don Anderson poll, commissioned by the PNP.
With a commanding 36.8 per cent for the PNP and 29 per cent for the JLP, 1,057 registered voters who were interviewed indicated where their support would go, if an election were to be called now.
This represents a 7.8 per cent lead for the opposition party.
It comes shortly after the PNP made significant inroads in voter support in the February 26 local government elections, claiming the majority vote, in a record low voter turnout for the local polls at 29 per cent.
Thirty-four per cent of respondents are either undecided at this time or do not intend to vote.
Support for the PNP traditionally comes from the older cohort.
In an interesting turn, the opposition has managed to rally a strong support from the 18-24 age group, splitting the voter intent equally with the JLP in that category.
Across the majority of polls conducted since 2016, the JLP has had better support in this young age cohort.
Pollster Don Anderson says the lead represents a historic turn for the People's National Party.
"Up to about January of 2023, none of the polls that I did had the PNP within touching distance of the Jamaica Labour Party. The average gap between 2016 and 2022 was about 12 percentage points in favour of the JLP, and then from 2023 we had a neck and neck situation when we had the PNP moving five percentage points ahead. That narrowed to three per cent round about December. When we did the one of the local government elections, the JLP had a one per cent gap," he recounted.
Six common areas were noted between the two parties from respondents.
Some 38.9 per cent of PNP supporters said their party had the best track record of management, while 40.2 per cent JLP supporters said the ruling party was better able manage Jamaica's economic situation.
Additionally, 25.8 per cent of JLP supporters said the party provided more jobs when compared with 10.9 per cent for the PNP.
With a 0.5 per cent difference, 8 per cent of respondents are supporting the PNP because of their crime fighting policies, when compared with the 7.5 per cent for the government.
Meanwhile, 16.3 per cent believe that the JLP has better social programmes while 17.6 per cent are in favour of those put in place by the JLP.
Some 34.6 per cent of JLP faithful said tradition fuelled their support when compared with 17.1 per cent of PNP supporters.
Also interesting to note is that 21.6 per cent of respondents said they will be voting for the JLP because it's a more organised party in comparison with the 13.2 per cent who said they will cast their ballots for the opposition because the party is now organised.
The other strong areas for the JLP come from the 45.1 per cent of the sample who said the government had the country's best interest at heart, the 10.1 per cent who believed the government presented better health care policies and the 17.3 per cent who thought the party has a strong youth network with good initiatives.
At the same time, 43.8 per cent of respondents said the opposition caters to the poor, 14.8 per cent said the PNP involves citizens in decision making while 8.8 per cent said they wanted a change in government.
Other factors listed in support for the PNP are that they have better leaders, have good plans and initiatives to run the country, that they are not familiar with the representatives from the other party and that they are desirous of a change in the government.
The poll was conducted by Market Research Services over a nine-day period between April 4 and 12.
It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 per cent.
Only one person per household was interviewed across the 14 parishes.
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