There is a new NIDA Poll which surveyed 1,245 people nationwide which was released April 18. The title of the poll is “Satisfaction with the government and the Prime Minister, 2nd poll, Performance of the government and the Prime Minister between January-March 2012 ” (“ความพึงพอใจต่อผลงานรัฐบาล และนายกรัฐมนตรี” ครั้งที่ 2 ในการปฏิบัติภารกิจของรัฐบาลและนายกรัฐมนตรีระหว่างเดือน มกราคม – มีนาคม 2555). NIDA notes that they will do this poll every quarter to enable people to follow the performance of the government on various aspects and to reflect the views of the people (โดยจะทำการสำรวจเป็นรายไตรมาสและมีการเปรียบเทียบในแต่ละไตรมาส เพื่อติดตามผลการทำงานของรัฐบาลในด้านต่างๆ และสะท้อนความคิดเห็นของประชาชน). BP blogged on the previous quarter from December 2011 here.
Unlike some polls, NIDA provides full access to survey data methodology so BP has included this at the end of this post (as noted below they have gone for equal geographic distribution by region which doesn’t reflect the nationwide population).*
For comparison purposes, BP has included previous NIDA polls to get some context about what the scores mean (i.e is 6.5 out of 10 a phenomenally good score or well just average). It is best to compare polls from the same organization and when the same questions are asked. BP has found NIDA polls on the performance of former Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and his government from August 2009-May 2010 and have included those (yes, it would have been better to have included a more diverse time period like BP did with the Suan Dusit polls, but these are the only ones that BP could find) and from the December 2011 NIDA poll on the Yingluck government.
1. Satisfaction that the people have towards the Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra (ความพึงพอใจของประชาชนต่อตัวนายกรัฐมนตรี “นางสาวยิ่งลักษณ์ ชินวัตร”).
Source: Aug 09-May 10 (DOC); December 2011 (HTML and PDF); April 2012 (HTML and PDF)
Note: Ratings are not out of 100, it is simply satisfied/not satisfied (approval rating).
1.1. To explain the weighted and population fields, the poll surveyed 1,245 people nationwide, but it did so equally by region regardless of the population of that region which resulted in the number of people being surveyed as follows: Bangkok 249, Central 247, North 249, Northeast 252, and South 248.
Mahidol University has a population gazette - used January 2011figures – which provides the population of each region and so the “Pop” field in BP’s chart above is the percentage of Thailand’s total population which is in that region. For the “Weighted” field, the key figure is the total of 71.38% which is the adjusted figure that comes out when you weigh the April 12 figures by the percentage of the population of each region. This means that Yingluck has a 71.38% approval rating which is an increase from 63.16%
This is more reflective than the unweighted nationwide figure of 68.5% which you get when you add the Dec 11 figures together and divide by 5 with no adjustment made for population.** BP hasn’t adjusted the Democrat figures downwards as BP found no mention in the NIDA source of the geographical breakdown for the previous polls - from BP’s experience with NIDA polls and looking at the survey data from the elections, they were very accurate with their geographical breakdown (see here and here) – so it would be unfair to adjust the Democrat government ratings (they would likely go down slightly given the Democrats do better in the South which has a smaller population than the Northeast). The unweighted figures show an increase from 57.14% to 68.5%. This is because Yingluck’s biggest jump in support is in the South (13% of population) and her drop in support in the Northeast (33% of population).
Note: The individual regional figures for December 11 and April 12 are still accurate. It is only the total figures which aren’t reflective.
1.2 Yingluck’s improvement in performance is also reflected in other polls. An ABAC poll showed a 7% increase in support for Yingluck from January to February and a Suan Dusit showed Yingluck went from 5.49 (out of 10) in December to 5.9 in February (now it is above 6 for April – but well have yet to blog on that).
2. Percentage of people who are satisfied with the performance of Yingluck government in solving various problems (ร้อยละของประชาชนที่พึงพอใจต่อการแก้ไขปัญหาด้านต่างๆ ของรัฐบาลนางสาวยิ่งลักษณ์ ชินวัตร)
NOTE: Ratings are not out of 10, it is simply satisfied/not satisfied (approval rating). Bkk, Central, North, NE, and South are from April 2012.
BP:
2.1 Again, BP has included the weighed numbers based on the population of each region. See explanation in 1.1 (used same population stats from Mahidol).These are issues chosen by NIDA and well, the choosing of them is quite subjective – the economic one is likely to be important in an election than say the South – but at least they asked the same questions for the Abhisit government so there is some point of comparison. Needless to say, those in the North and the Northeast are relatively happy with most things, ie 55% are satisfied with the performance in solving problems in the Deep South compared with only 11% in the South who are satisfied. Clearly, their views of the government – positive or negative – is reflected in their assessment.
2.2 That the Yingluck’s government does well – increase from 47% to 69% – for its drugs policy. This is not surprising as an ABAC poll from mid-February, the drugs policy it was the top-rated government policy.
2.3 On all other issues, the government’s performance has declined. On the Deep South, down from 37% to 21%; Corruption from 40% to 30%; political conflict from 43% to 30%. These are big declines. The decline in the Deep South, well the Hat Yai and the Yala coordinated bombings no doubt played a big part in the poor score. Political conflict/unity decline can be seen from increased tension regarding constitutional amendments and amnesty.
2.4 Also, and most crucially on the economy/living costs there is a decline from 51% to 50%. Other polling suggests that the cost of living and the cost of goods is a concern although people don’t necessarily blame the government or think the government is doing a bad job compared with previous government. Actually, the decline on the economy/cost of living varies from region – you see the non-weighted figures shows an increase in performance which can be explained by the regional figures. For Bangkok, from December 2011 to April, it went from 41.88 to 41.4; for Central region, it went from 44.77 to 41.7; for the North it went from 56.32 to 56.2; for the Northeast from 71.69 to 56.3 and the South from 14.13 to 48.4 (hence, this is why the unweighted figure shows an increase in the economy, it is all from the South).
So not much change for Bangkok, Central and the North. For the Northeast, a dramatic decline. This is also consistent with the E-san poll which showed a decline from 76.1 (December 2011) to 50.9 (February-March 2012). For the South, a dramatic increase. Not sure what the explanation is. 14.13 was not really reflective of the actual economy and was more reflective of the fact that the South is strongly Democrat and so partisan responses were reflected according (vice-versa for the Northeast). This doesn’t mean they will all vote Puea Thai.
NOTE: While you have real cost of living increase problems – reflected in various polls – you also have a rebounding economy in Q1.
3. Points for performance of the Yingluck government (คะแนนผลงานโดยรวมของรัฐบาลนางสาวยิ่งลักษณ์ ชินวัตร).
This was one is rather short as NIDA don’t have a regional breakdown so no chart. There has been a drop from 6.24 (unweighted) to 6.23 (unweighted).
3.1 From one perspective, it seems odd that the PM’s approval rating is going up, but the government’s performance is declining (albeit by only .01). BP should note that there is a difference between ratings out of 10 and satisfaction/approval. For example, if you are somewhat supportive of the government, but not overall satisfied, you may only give the government a rating of 3 or 4 which still helps for government when working out the overall rating, but in such an example you would give a “not satisfied” which means Yingluck gets the equivalent of a zero. This can also work in reverse and if you are only somewhat satisfied with the government, you may only give a 6, but you still give Yingluck a satisfied so it is a full score.
Of course, you have the separate fact that one is asking about Yingluck and the other is asking about the government and people may have different views on these. The same was for Abhisit and his government – see Abhisit’s scores in the South versus those of his government. Nevertheless, Abhisit always scored much higher than his government and now we are seeing the same trend for Yingluck.
3.2 On the 6.23 score being higher than the average score for the issues in 2. Well, these are specific issues asked by NIDA. There are many other issues, from education, foreign affairs, healthcare etc which are not included in 2, but are issues which people will take into consideration when giving a rating for the government.
*Survey data methodology:
Region: Bangkok 249, Central 247, North 249, Northeast 252, and South 248
Sex: Males 53%; Females 47%
Age:
Under 25, 143 (11.5%)
25-39, 492 (39.5%)
40-59, 515 (41.4%)
60+, 95 (7.6%)
BP: As with most polls, this seems to under-represent those aged over 60 although not as badly as most polls. This is probably because these people are more likely to be at home and are harder to survey.
Religion:
Buddhist 94%,
Christian 1%,
Muslim 5%
Education Status : Grade 6 or less, 315 (25.3%)
Grade 12 or equivalent, 456 (36.6%)
Vocational Certificate or equivalent, 106 (8.5%)
Bachelor’s degree or equivalent, 328 (26.3%)
Higher than Bachelor’s degree, 40 (3.2%)
Employment Status:
Civil Servant/state enterprise, 171 (13.7%)
Private company employee, 277 (22.2%)
Business owner/freelance (includes self-employed), 282 (22.7%)
Farmers/laborers, 245 (19.7%)
Housewife/house-husband/retired/unemployed, 157 (12.6%)
Students, 113 (9.1%)
BP: Again, the “Housewife/house-husband/retired/unemployed” category probably under-represents this group and the student group is over-represented although this is the nature of most polls (i.e as they are mostly at home and hence more difficult to survey).
Income (monthly):
None, 233 (18.7%)
Less than 10,000, 497 (39.9%)
10,001-20,000, 382 (30.7%)
20,001-30,000, 33 (2.7%)
More than 40,000, 64 (5.1%)
Unspecified, 36 (2.9%)
BP: They missed out 30,000–40,000 in the poll, but all the numbers add up to 100% so assume it should be “More than 30,000″.
**BP couldn’t find an explanation that NIDA had already adjusted the regional ratings by population. There is mention of the SE Mean figure but the Poll itself doesn’t say that NIDA has already adjusted the ratings and given that the total figure is simply reached by adding up the regional ratings and dividing by 5, BP has to assume NIDA hasn’t. The alternative is that NIDA has adjusted the regional ratings which would be a little bizarre if they did so as the regional ratings are accurate, the only figure you need to adjust is the total.
