Information gathered indicates that handlers of Dr. Mahamudu Bawumia’s Campaign Team are yet to come to terms with fake polls conducted by Outcome International Ghana and Center for Sustainable African Development Initiative putting Dr. Bawumia ahead in the New Patriotic Party (NPP) presidential primaries.
Fact-check revealed that the organisations that recently announced that the Vice President is leading over his main contender former Minister of Trade and Industry, Alan Kwadwo Kyerematen are not credible research institutions.
The organisations Center for Sustainable African Development Initiatives (CSADI) and Outcomes International Ghana (OIG) are unknown institutions with scanty information on them.
Further investigations discovered that apart from 19 Wisden Road, Stevenage Hertfordshire SG1 5NJ, UK as the registered address of Sustainable African Development Initiatives, the main organisation responsible for the suspicious credibility deficient polls, it has an unreported telephone number, unreported email address, unreported website, etc. which is very unlike a credible international research institution in any modern society.
It would be recorded that in December 2022, the two firms jointly conducted the month-long survey between November 15, 2022, and December 15, 2022.
The survey also revealed that nearly 90% of the delegates believe that a candidate’s religious affiliation does not matter to them when electing a flagbearer. The study was done in all 16 regions of the country using an estimated 197,000 NPP polling station executives (PSEs) as the target audience.
Going to every election, various think tanks, research institutions, media houses and individuals conduct audience research to aid political analysis and conversations.
In recent times, however, mushroom organisations have sprouted all over the place to influence national political discourses with all manner of predetermined research findings to create bandwagon effects for their clients or favourite aspirants.
“Our politicians know that a lot of people are gullible so they can easily get their attention with some of these cooked polls results to create a bandwagon effect on their audiences,” one political analyst observed.
“Otherwise, why would anybody take a research body established about a year ago without any well-built credibility and reputation serious enough to discuss on major news and current affairs platforms without interrogating the source and other tangible details?” he asked.
“Now that we know that it’s bogus, let’s discard it. But, next time, journalists must first vet and interrogate the backgrounds of sources critically, check the methodology and other tangible features of authentic and credible research work before they disseminate the findings.”
