THE POWERHOUSE PRELIMINARY POLL FOR CHOISEUL/SALTIBUS

A small team from the Choiseul Powerhouse decided to conduct a simple windscreen survey to primarily determine the impact of Chastanet’s “5-TO-STAY-ALIVE” plan on the Choiseul/Saltibus constituency.

Here is a brief summary of the results.

(a)        age 60+                 -       enthusiastic;

(b)        age 45                   -       60 moderate to less enthusiastic;

(c)         age 30 - 44            -       moderate to less enthusiastic;

(d)        under 30                -       less enthusiastic

It appeared the most enthusiastic section of the sample was leaning UWP, with the moderately enthusiastic seemingly ambivalent. Most of the less enthusiastic sample seemed to be leaning SLP or independent.

Two major findings may be extrapolated from the results:

(1)        There is a suggestion that there is a correlation between age and enthusiasm;

(2)        A large section of the sample seemed not to keen in politics so far.

There is a suggestion that the excitement of the respective bases of the two parties is still sporadic but slowly “catching up”. However, it would appear that none of the running candidates seems to have excited their base or the swing voters sufficiently to own bragging rights.

The trend shown above is not new. From 2001, the support for the political parties has been delicately poised (SLP = 49%; UWP = 48%; and swing = 3%). Hence, the small swing vote becomes the major determinant of the electoral outcome.

Theoretically, one of major reasons for that “support configuration” was perhaps Rufus Bousquet who, because of a significant personal support base, changed Choiseul from an SLP safe seat to a swing constituency.

There is little reason to believe that the trend may change in the upcoming election.

However, keep in mind that the results of survey are not scientific and hence may not be sufficiently reliable to generalised them to the entire constituency.