An unofficial online survey which lasted 24 hours and was published in Sahara Reporters has shown former Head of State, Gen. Muhammadu Buhari (rtd.) besting President Goodluck Jonathan and three others as regards who among them is expected to win next year’s presidential election.
Out of the 13,700 respondents to the poll, 10,280 of them overwhelmingly voted for General Buhari, giving him a 75% lead. This data corroborates a previous poll in which President Jonathan and Gen. Buhari were matched head-to-head, a pairing that suggested a win for Buhari with 78% of the vote cast.
That particular poll prompted President Jonathan’s aide on social media, Reno Omokri, to conduct another poll, featuring both Jonathan and Buhari. Controversy surrounds that survey because the poll was closed suddenly when the incumbent was shown to be leading by just one point, after trailing Gen. Buhari the entire time.
However, the present survey, which ran for 24 hours through the independent third-party service E-POLL indicates that Jonathan, irrespective of being the incumbent President of Nigeria would lose to Buhari, an APC presidential aspirant, if the 2015 election were to be conducted today.
The survey sought to know: “If the 2015 Nigerian presidential election were held today, which of these 5 candidates do you think would emerge President of Nigeria?”
The five candidates were President Jonathan (PDP), Gen. Muhammad Buhari (APC), Speaker of the House of Reps Aminu Tambuwal (APC), Abubakar Atiku, former Vice President (APC), and the Kano State governor Rabiu Kwankwaso, also of the APC.
An analysis of the poll reveals that President Jonathan received 1,966 votes, a share of 14%. Governor Kwankwaso received 6% of the voting share with 735 votes. Speaker Tambuwal and former Vice President Atiku received 519 (4%) and 200 (1%) of the vote, respectively. At this poll, respondents were drawn from across the world as was the case in the previous online survey..