68pc term prime minister’s resignation demand unfair

KARACHI: As the opposition flexes its muscles to garner public support on the PanamaLeak probe, people are seeing things a little differently. While they partially support the Opposition’s demand for a probe against the PM but see duplicity in the PTI chief’s stance when he demands his resignation. 

Half of the people surveyed are also satisfied with the PM’s performance. This was revealed in Gallup Pakistan’s recent survey, which was carried out among a sample of 1,707 men and women in the rural and urban areas of all the four provinces of the country, during May 30–June 6, 2016. The error margin is estimated to be approximately 2-3 percent at 95 percent confidence level.

In the survey, when the people were asked to give their views on different issues related to the PanamaLeaks, they minced no words and spoke out clearly on how they wanted things to be.

The survey started with the question related to the opposition’s important demand in which it wants the PanamaLeaks investigation to begin with PM Nawaz Sharif. As many as 50 percent of the respondents rejected the idea and said that the investigation should be held together for all the people mentioned in the Panama Papers. But 48 percent supported the demand and were of the view that the investigation should begin with the prime minister.

The people’s opinion wasresignation when he, himself, had not yet declared his offshore companies.

Responding to this, 68 percent of the people agreed that it was dishonesty of Imran Khan to ask for PM Nawaz Sharif’s resignation, while 29 percent believed that it was not the case and his demand was legitimate. As many as 3 percent claimed they did not know about the issue.

Further, people were asked to suggest whether Imran Khan’s stance was justified, in which he claimed that he had the right to form offshore companies as he was not a British citizen.

Responding to this, 62 percent people said that Imran Khan’s stance was not justified while 36 percent said it was justified. However, 2 percent didn’t respond to the query.

In the survey people were also asked that according to them which party owned the highest number of offshore companies.

Responding to this, 42 percent claimed that the Pakistan Muslim League–Nawaz (PML-N) had the most offshore companies, 18 percent claimed that it was the Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) and 15 percent believed Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) owned most of the offshore companies, 8 percent named MQM and the PML-Q, as most offshore companies holder while 2 percent believed that it was the MMA which owned the most offshore companies however, 7 percent did not respond to this question.

Pakistani people were also asked that some people were of the view that it was legal to form offshore companies in some foreign countries, so the owner of these companies should not be punished in Pakistan.

Responding to this overwhelmingly, 76 percent claimed that the owners of offshore companies should be punished in the country while 21 percent claimed that they should not be punished in Pakistan. However, 3 percent didn’t respond to the question.

In the survey, the people were also asked to evaluate Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif’s performance and how much they were satisfied with it.

Responding to this, 54 percent said they were quite satisfied with the Prime Ministers’ performance. Of the 54 percent, 21 percent said they were much satisfied while 33 percent claimed they were satisfied to some extent.

In contrast, 16 percent of the people surveyed said they were very much dissatisfied with the PM’s performance, while 15 percent said they were dissatisfied with the Prime Ministers’ performance to some extent.

However, 15 percent of the respondents said they were neither satisfied nor dissatisfied. In the survey, the people were also asked to choose from these two forms of government -- democracy or dictatorship.

Responding to this, majority of the people, 84 percent believe that democracy is a better alternative to dictatorship, while 16 percent people hold the opinion that dictatorship is a better option.

Gallup Pakistan survey also asked people, whether they believed that PTI leader Jehangir Tarin had his loans waived off from various banks as claimed by PML-N.

Replying to this, 38 percent people said they thought the claim was ‘very true’, while 40 percent believed it was ‘true to some extent’. However, 9 percent of the people in the survey said the PML-N’s claim was false, while 10 percent said that the claim was false to some extent. However, 3 percent didn’t reply to this question.

It was further asked if the allegation against Jehangir Tarin was true and if they thought there should be an investigation regarding this matter.

Also Read: What are opinion polls and how are they conducted?

Responding to this, 92percent of the people participating in the survey supported the idea and said there should be an investigation into this matter, while 8 percent disagreed and said there was no need of an investigation.