NOIPOLLS, Nigeria’s leading surveying and polling firm, says that, the average approval rating of President Muhammadu Buhari in his first term in office stands at 49.3 percent with his latest rating of 36 percent in May 2019.

The firm said in its approval rating released on Wednesday in Abuja that following the inauguration of President Buhari for another term of four years on the 29th of May, 2019, it released figures from its monthly approval rating for the 4-year period (June 2015 to May 2019).

According to the results released, President Buhari’s scorecard was highest in his first year in office with an average of 63.9 percent and that the rating could been influenced by his high rating in September and October 2015 with 78 and 80 percent respectively.

It noted that Buhari’s performance was rated lowest in his fourth year in office with an average of 41.3 percent.

“Similarly, Nigerians also appraised the performance of President Buhari on specific indicators using a Likert scale of 1 to 5, where 1 represents ‘Very Poor’ and 5 represents ‘Excellent’. Starting off with his 3 cardinal policy thrusts: the president was rated 36 percent on Security; 27 percent on Corruption; and 16 percent on the Economy.

“Correspondingly, he scored 37 percent on Agriculture and Food Security, 26 percent on Power, 25 percent on Healthcare, 24 percent on Education, 22 percent on Infrastructure, 15 percent on Job Creation, and 13 percent on Poverty Alleviation. Averagely, the President was rated poorly on all indicators analysed in his first term in office,” the report said.

The report concluded that the Nigerian President recorded an average performance of 49.3 percent in his first term in office and rated poorly on some specific indicators in his first four years in office.

“This is no surprise to us considering our constant interactions with the public and our numerous field visits across the country.

“For instance, job creation recorded a poor average of 15 percent in his first term in office and this may suggest that some Nigerians are unemployed,” the report said.

It quoted the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS, as saying that Nigeria’s unemployment rate increased from 18.8 percent in the third quarter of 2017 to 23.1 percent in the third quarter of 2018 and that it is important for the government and other stakeholders to ensure that adequate job creation policies and social safety nets are mapped out and properly implemented to tackle unemployment and poverty in the country.

NOIPolls has been conducting these polls on a monthly series to evaluate the performance of Nigeria’s sitting president since January 2013 and it has continued through the assumption of office of President Buhari.

– June 5, 2019 @ 15:19 GMT |