The Crest is in possession of an opinion poll conducted by an American consulting firm, commissioned by the Atiku Abubakar Campaign Organisation, on its chances in Saturday’s presidential election.
In the report, dated February 05, 2019, and addressed to Dr. Bukola Abubakar Saraki, Director General of the Atiku Abubakar Campaign Organisation, Ballard Partners, submitted that the result of the poll it conducted across Nigeria’s six geo-political zones showed that Buhari would win the election by 51% with Atiku scoring 49%.
The report, signed by Brian D. Ballard, said categorically that “Buhari cannot be stopped”’.
“Buhari is leading the vote with 9 points (51% / 42%),” Ballard Partners said in the February 05, 2019, report. “Undecideds are at 4% and all other will score a total of 3%. So, Buhari cannot be stopped.
“Voters generally approve of how Buhari has been handling his job and have positive view towards him. Voters generally do not like Atiku because of the corruption issues around him.
“Poor for Buhari, middle class for Atiku –but poor are the majority.
“Many people are disappointed with the choice they have: 19% of PVC holders said they don’t see the reason to vote.
“No other candidate is going to get up to 2%. 87% of APC supporters endorse Buhari, but only 71% of PDP supporters endorse Atiku.
“South-South and South-East which were supposed to be the Atiku’s
regional strongholds, are not as much negative towards Buhari as where expected.”
Full report later.
Below is a copy of Brian Ballard”s letter to Saraki on the poll:
STRICTLY CONFIDENTIAL
February 05, 2019
Dear Dr. Saraki,
I hereby forward for your attention the results of public opinion poll conducted for us in accordance with the previous agreement. I stress that access to this report should be for you and the candidate’s eyes’ only.
The results of the poll are, to put it bluntly, very negative for us. They dramatically differ from those you recently announced. My pollster experts assured me that the reason is that the sample was not enough for a diverse country as Nigeria. They interviewed only 1550 people which is less than 250 per geopolitical zone; and they couldn’t cover more than 2 states per zone. The attached report suggests that there is a significant difference in results
for states even within the same zone. We can also be sure that they haven’t reached remote rural areas which are Buhari’s strongholds. You might remember that Hillary lost to us in 2016 because of overconfidence induced partly by erroneous poll results.
Our figures demonstrate that we have a very slim chance of winning. I believe that all possible urgent steps need to be taken to rectify the situation. As you may recall, as far back as mid-December, you referred to possible steps required to guarantee an upper hand. These steps should now be taken.
We have reviewed the situation and we have come up with some ideas which I will share with you at our next meeting.
Sincerely,
Brian D. Ballard
