Poll: Most Kenyan rural voters happy with their MPs

Ipsos’ researcher Tom Wolf

NAIROBI: Slightly more than half of Kenyans in rural areas would re-elect their current MPs, according to a new opinion poll.

The poll by Ipsos shows that 53 per cent of voters would be happy to re-elect current MPs.

On the other hand, 29 per cent of those polled have vowed not to re-elect their MPs.

Another 19 per cent are "not sure" about voting their current legislators back to Parliament even though they voted for them in the 2013 elections.

Ipsos only captured the mood in rural areas. The pollster said it did not carry out the study in urban areas, saying many residents of these areas are largely unaware of their MPs.

The poll was conducted on 2002 Kenyans above 18 years between July 30 and August 9 this year.

Interestingly, more respondents from the Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (CORD) (57 per cent) said they would vote their MPs back in, compared to Jubilee (52 per cent).

This means that CORD MPs in rural areas might find their way back to Parliament more easily than their Jubilee counterparts.

Jubilee has more supporters (20 per cent) who are unsure of re-electing their current MPs than CORD (12 per cent), whose supporters seemed to have largely made up their minds.

The poll also shows that Kenyans are sharply divided on the performance of the current Parliament compared to the previous one.

While 37 per cent said it has performed better, another 30 per cent insist it has performed worse. However, 18 per cent of the respondents said the performance is the same.

CORD supporters appear more dissatisfied with the current Parliament with majority of them (42 per cent) saying it has performed worse compared 23 per cent who give it a thumbs up.

On the other hand, a majority of Jubilee supporters (50 per cent) say the current Parliament has performed better than the last one, while 23 per cent said its performance is worse.

For those who said the current Parliament has performed better, they cited development, leadership and implementation of the Constitution as their main reasons.

Those who gave it a thumbs down cited poor leadership, corruption and Parliamentary procedure as their main reasons.

The poll also showed that more Kenyans in rural areas (85 per cent) know their MPs, compare to those their counterparts in urban areas (69 per cent). Nairobi has the lowest number of people (59 per cent) who know their MP.

The poll indicates that people in Western region had the highest number (89 per cent) of those familiar with their MPs followed by Eastern, Central and North Eastern regions while Coast and Rift valley were among the least.