Politics

‘PTI’s popularity is 70%’: How credible is the survey Imran Khan cited?

Published

11 months ago

Farwa

Former prime minister Imran Khan has made a bullish claim, insisting that a recent survey finds his political party’s popularity soaring to 70% in the Punjab province. But the survey Khan has cited, may be based on limited and arguably sketchy data, Geo Fact Check finds.

“Look at this graph,” the 70-year-old leader said, in a recorded video message on Wednesday, “The result of a survey. This tells you that right now the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) is 70% popular.”

He repeated the claim in an interview with Al Jazeera on the same day.

The survey Khan is quoting was conducted by an Islamabad-based think tank, which goes by the name of Republic Policy.

As per the website of the think tank, the poll was conducted between May 10 and 15 in Punjab and its data found that 70% of the respondents it reached out to had a favourable opinion of Imran Khan.

While the former prime minister’s political rivals, Nawaz Sharif, Shehbaz Sharif and Maryam Nawaz had a combined popularity of only 18%.

However, neither the think tank’s web portal nor its YouTube channel provides any additional information on the methodology used to collect the information, the cities and rural areas in Punjab it targeted or the sample size of the survey.

Tahir Maqsood Chheena, one of the heads of Republic Policy, told Geo Fact Check over the phone, that 10-15 students, who worked as volunteers, helped him complete the survey.

“I also called people myself,” he added, “People who I knew, as well as sent teams in the field.”

Even more astounding is the sample size of the survey.

Chheena alleged that the think tank interviewed 25 people in each union council of the province. Punjab has over 4,015 union councils, which would mean that the Republic Policy reached out to an astounding 100,375 people in just five days.

“I cannot tell you an exact number of the sample size,” Chheena said, “It could have been 90,000 or 100,000.”

When asked if his team identified people scientifically, based on their income and profession, amongst other things. He said: “We did nothing as such. You have the right to say we did not do it [the survey] properly. Next time we will keep this in mind.”

The Republic Policy conducted a similar survey in March, where it again found Imran Khan’s popularity to be 62% in Punjab, much ahead of all other politicians.

Bilal Gilani, the executive director at Gallup Pakistan, said that in order to determine the quality of a survey it is important to tell the readers the sample size and the profile of the respondents interviewed, in terms of profession etc.

“I saw this survey and it didn’t tell you the sample size or the profiles,” he told Geo Fact Check.

He added that as per the international code of ethics for polling organisations, they must transparently disclose all information about themselves, including what they do and how.

“Even these details are scarce about the Republic Policy,” he said.

What is Republic Policy?

The think tank was launched in November 2022, Chheena said. It is run by him and “some other friends” who are all retired civil servants. Chheena himself is a former police official.

On social media, most of its tweets are favourable to Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI).

Latest News

The IHC upholds Bushra Bibi’s request to be transferred from Bani Gala to Adiala Jail.

Published

20 hours ago

Farwa

Bushra Bibi’s request to be transferred from Bani Gala to Adiala Jail was granted by the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Thursday.

The former first lady Bushra Bibi’s application to be transferred from Bani Gala sub-jail to Adiala was heard today.

Details reveal that the Islamabad High Court heard a motion to restore the denied petition about the relocation of Bushra Bibi, the wife of PTI founder, from sub-jail Bani Gala to Adiala.

The application for the reinstatement of appeal was heard by Justice Miagul Hassan Aurangzeb. When state attorney Abdul Rehman entered the courtroom on behalf of the state, Usman Riaz Gill represented the former first lady.

State counsel did not object to the appeal being restored during court proceedings. At the following hearing, the court asked for assistance in determining what conditions must be met for a location to be designated as a sub-jail.

The court also mandated that Bushra Bibi’s medical examination be scheduled. The court subsequently delayed the hearing and gave instructions to fix the appeal for April 22.

Recall that the attorneys for former first lady Bushra Bibi, Barrister Salman Safdar, Usman Riaz Gill, and Khalid Yusuf Chaudhary, had filed an application to restore the dismissed appeal a day ago, but the Islamabad High Court had denied their request to pursue the case.

The petition contended that the traffic gridlock at the Sarina Chowk checkpoint was the reason for the delay in getting to the court.

The attorneys did not purposefully take their time getting to court. They warned that the petitioner would suffer irreversible loss if the petition was not resurrected.

IHC Justice Miangul Hassan Aurangzeb has voiced his displeasure at the absence of attorneys from the court.

According to Judge Aurangzeb, the former first lady would have been imprisoned if Bushra Bibi’s attorneys had prevailed in this case. The attorneys themselves were opposed to Bushra Bibi’s incarceration.

Latest News

oath-taking ceremony for the Balochistan cabinet postponed

Published

20 hours ago

Farwa

The Balochistan cabinet’s oath-taking ceremony, which was supposed to take place at the Governor’s House today (Thursday), has been rescheduled.
The Governor’s House spokeswoman announced that the Balochistan cabinet’s swearing-in event has been postponed. Nevertheless, there was no explanation provided for the ceremony’s postponement.

It is important to note that the 14-member Balochistan cabinet, which consists of two members from the Balochistan Awami Party (BAP) and six ministers from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) was set to take the oath of office today, Thursday.

Latest News

Senior PML-N leaders want the X ban lifted.

Published

20 hours ago

Farwa

A veteran party leader and former railways minister, Khawaja Saad Rafique, claimed the caretaker government’s social media ban didn’t help anyone.

Saad Rafique warned his party’s present government to avoid becoming a laughing stock since politics requires political moves.

“Bans and prohibitions come where dictatorship prevails over democracy,” PML-N veteran Javed Abbasi remarked of the social media ban.

“Can we ban matches factories fearing they ignite fire?” he asked. He said, “We scare of truth and try to keep it under the veil.”

He called the PML-N administration cruel for banning free speech.

The Interior Ministry said the Islamabad High Court (IHC) on Wednesday that X, formerly Twitter, needed to be banned since it violated Pakistani legislation.

Interior Secretary Khurram Agha reported on the high court’s rulings on the social media ban petition for the ministry.

Social networking site X was down for two months in Pakistan when the hearing took place.