Cyril Ramaphosa receives highest score as party leader - poll

A poll just released two days before South Africans go to the polls on Wednesday gives President Cyril Ramaphosa 6.5 out of 10 rating as a political party leader.

A poll just released two days before South Africans go to the polls on Wednesday gives President Cyril Ramaphosa 6.5 out of 10 rating as a political party leader.

Published May 6, 2019

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Cape Town - A poll just released two days before South Africans go to the polls on Wednesday gives President Cyril Ramaphosa 6.5 out of 10 rating as a political party leader.

The survey conducted in March and April by global market research and a consulting firm, Ipsos, among 3500 respondents, gauges the reactions of South Africans to how the president, premiers and governments of the nine provinces were doing.

According to the research,  Ramaphosa’s received a good score compared to scores of the leaders of the main opposition parties in the country.

Democratic Alliance leader Mmusi Maimane scored at 3.5 out of 10 and Julius Malema, Economic Freedom Fighters commander-in-chief, scored at 3.4 out of 10.

The survey also looked at speculation that the president might replace current deputy president David Mabuza after Wednesday’s general election and replace him with Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma. Looking at the scores out of these two leaders, it is evident that Dlamini-Zuma was more popular than the current deputy president among registered voters, but by a rather narrow margin. Dlamini-Zuma scored 4.2 as a political leader on this scale, while Mabuza scored stands at 3.9.

Just over half of registered voters polled (54 percent) felt that the national government was doing its job “very well” or “fairly well”, whereas president Ramaphosa was seen to do his job very or fairly well among 62 percent of those polled.

There is definitely less appreciation for local authorities and less than half, 49 percent said that their municipality was doing its job very or fairly well, possibly part of the cause of the current widespread service delivery protests in the country.

On provincial government, the survey revealed the Western Cape government and premier Helen Zille topped the performance list, as evaluated by the registered voters polled in each respective province. Four provincial governments, the Western Cape, Northern Cape, Gauteng and the Free State got a “pass mark” of more than 50 percent for handling their jobs very or fairly well.  

On the side of the premiers only two, Helen Zille and Sylvia Lucas, achieve a “pass mark” of over 50 percent.  

Overall, the provincial governments were faring better than the premiers. Phumulo Masualle of the Eastern Cape and Job Mokgoro of North West received especially low appreciation for the work they do.  However, in the case of Mokgoro, it could definitely not have been plain sailing to take over from Supra Mahumapelo, the previous North West premier who was asked to vacate his post.

African News Agency (ANA)

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