The Jamaica Labour Party won the general elections after a number of polls and forecast called it for the governing Peoples National Party. Two groups that the public is not used to for forecasting elections made a fool of themselves, suggesting the PNP would win at least 40 seats.
According to the university forecasters, the PNP chance of winning the election was down from 60 percent to 56 percent, since the refusal of the party to participate in the election debates. The forecast done by Dr Christopher Charles and Gleasha Reid was laughable when viewed against other facts and historical trends. For one, pollsters that have had a fairly good track record were pointing to, at best, a close election victory for the PNP, in what looked like a close race. One pollster out of Trinidad, did get the marginal seats right, when the polls they did showed a strong swing to the JLP.
The results of the 2016 election, is a clear indication that polls reflect the position at the time the poll is taken and does not necessarily forecast future outcome. The poll that the PNP seemed to have used to call the election, did not reflect the real party standing. IC Insider suggested, that past polls have always reflected an incumbency bias, as high as 5 percent, ahead of the actual official election period, this is pretty much what happened as the January polls by Anderson had the PNP at 27.5 percent and the JLP at 23.2 percent. When the JLP’s support is adjusted by the 5 percent, it placed both parties in a dead heat with a slight lead for the JLP. The polls show that both parties lost active support since September last year. The December polls show that the PNP lost 2 percentage points and the JLP a much larger 6.4 percentage points, taking the latter below the core position held from 2014 to June, of 25 percent.
About the January polls, IC Insider said “If the latest poll numbers were to hold come election day, the PNP would end up with about 54 percent to 46 percent for the JLP of the votes, on a head to head race, which would put the PNP slightly ahead of the 2011 election, when they took 53.40 percent of the votes, to the JLP 46.60 percent.
Interestingly, while the Anderson polls were pointing to a big win for the PNP, RJR News carried on their website, a story of a then recent canvass done buy the PNP in which Paul Burke says they are sure to win 32 seats, with 10 of the rest they have in doubt.
“RJR News has obtained a copy of the report which outlines that the Party is sure of winning 32 of the 63 Parliamentary seats. Of the remaining 10 seats from the 42 which were won by the PNP in 2011, two are deemed at risk of being lost and eight have been declared hard to win”. This information does not reflect an outcome as indicated by Anderson polls.
There are a number of lessons from election 2016. Polls by themselves need to be examined against prevailing as well as past developments, to ensure they are in keeping with what the results are indicating. Events may take place that change the direction of the likely outcome, this is what may have happened this time around.
The polls showing the JLP at 25 percent of the electorate seem to suggest a solid base support, that is why IC Insider posted the need for the election turnout to be higher than 50 percent for the PNP to win. IC Insider had pointed out that the pollsters have never gotten the voter turnout right the question this time, with potential votes around 59 percent, it seems that the usual 15-20 percent difference was a bit too high.