Afro-barometer puts ED ahead of Chamisa

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By Dr. Phillan Zamchiya
Dear Reader,
The Mass Public Opinion Institute (MPOI) released the Afro-barometer survey on Zimbabwe on 10 July 2023.
Reader, the survey is not all rosy for the Citizens Coalition for Change (CCC)’s electoral prospects in the general election scheduled for 23 August 2023.
There is off course a paradox in the Afro-barometer research as I unpack later.
However, my view is that it is time for the CCC to collectively reflect and put all boots on the ground in order to turn the tide. This is a better approach because even if the survey turns out not to be a true reflection of political dynamics on the ground, the CCC would have increased its margin of victory come 23 August. In short, they would have lost nothing.
An easier and self-soothing approach would be to bury one’s head in the sand and continue with business as usual. This is dangerous because if the survey turns to be a true reflection of political dynamics on the ground, the CCC would have done nothing and lost everything with no room for correction till the 2028 general election.
Reader, in a turn of voting trends, the survey shows a decline in support for the opposition and a surge in support for the ruling Zimbabwe African National Union Patriotic Front (ZANU PF).
If presidential elections were to be held a day after the survey, the CCC leader would lose to the ZANU PF leader. The survey signals that 27 % of respondents would vote for Chamisa against 35% for Mnangagwa. This means that the CCC leader’s support base has decreased by 6 % since June 2022. This marks the first decline in Chamisa’s vote since he became leader of the opposition. When Chamisa took over from Tsvangirai, only 16% freely expressed intentions to vote for him but this had exponentially gone up to 33% by June 2022. Also of significance is that Chamisa’s vote used to be far ahead of his party but the gap has closed to 1%.
On the other end, the survey shows that Mnangagwa’s support base has increased by 5% since June 2022. Reader, this turns the tide because there has been a systematic pattern in the decline of Mnangagwa’s vote since he took over from Mugabe in a military coup. At least 38 % of surveyed citizens expressed intentions to vote for him in 2017 and by June 2022 this had dramatically gone down to 30%.
Of interest is that Mnangagwa’s vote used to be far below that of his party [ZANU PF] but there is now some equalisation. This, as it stands, might signal a reduction in deviation politics i.e. bhora musango.
However, a significant number of respondents, 26% and 27%, refused to reveal their preferences for the parliamentary and presidential elections respectively.
This is not surprising in a repressive environment. Opposition supporters are more likely to fear expressing their political affiliation compared to ruling party members in authoritarian contexts.
Nevertheless, it is not a given that all those who refused to say their preference would vote for the CCC unless they tell us so.
The good news for CCC though is that this base of potential voters is huge enough to swing the vote in their favour and win both at parliamentary and presidential level, that is if they do the right things and the environment becomes relatively free and fair.
Reader, ZANU PF and Mnangagwa’s lead partly remains a paradox though because the survey shows that most people are not happy. A majority of respondents (65%) say the country is going in the wrong direction; a large majority (69%) say the economy is bad and 62% say the living conditions are bad and this constitutes an equal proportion from both the urban and rural areas.
An overwhelming majority (85%) say the government has performed badly in addressing key issues such as unemployment, corruption, the economy and managing the economy.
Why then would the same people still vote for a failing government and not for the opposition? I can deduct four broad answers from the survey results.
First is that some people do not believe that an election under the current authoritarian environment can result in a change of government. From the survey, a majority, 54% of respondents, do not believe that an election can remove the badly performing ZANU PF leaders. Second, a significant number, 49% of respondents, believe the announced results will not reflect the counted votes. It reminds me of Joseph Stalin’s attributed statement that ‘It’s not the people who vote that count, it’s the people who count the votes’. Third, about six in 10 (59%) fear that they will become victims of political violence during elections. Consequently, some people vote to ensure ‘peace’ in communities given that 50% of respondents said past elections have led to violence in their neighbourhood. This shows us that without the needed political and democratising reforms, citizens can see elections as a mere ritual that fail to express the people’s will. Fourth, the bad performance by ZANU PF does not automatically lead to the transfer of votes to CCC. The CCC has to convince the electorate that it has better socio-economic policies, a more democratic culture and the stamina to govern. Reader, rehashing ZANU PF’s naked failures is not enough. For now, I have stated my case and it is up to the CCC to unleash a robust and tectonic institutional response on the ground.

Elections: Rational irrationality

After reading the Afro-barometer new survey which says President Emmerson Mnangagwa is leading his rival opposition CCC leader Nelson Chamisa by 8%, while an overwhelming majority (85%) says government has performed badly, some Zimbabweans found this irrational – understandably so.
How can Mnangagwa be more popular than Chamisa, whose support is said to have declined by 6%, when his government is doing so badly in the eyes of potential voters, they ask.
Even political analysts such as Dr Phillan Zamchiya found this to be a “paradox”.
“Zanu PF and Mnangagwa’s lead partly remains a paradox though because the survey shows that most people are not happy,”
Zamchiya wrote yesterday.
“A majority of respondents (65%) say the country is going in the wrong direction; a large majority (69%) say the economy is bad and 62% say the living conditions are bad and this constitutes an equal proportion from both the urban and rural areas.”
However, Zamchiya goes on to explain the “paradox” saying:
“First is that some people do not believe that an election under the current authoritarian environment can result in a change of government. From the survey, a majority, 54% of respondents, do not believe that an election can remove the badly performing Zanu PF leaders.
“Second, a significant number, 49% of respondents, believe the announced results will not reflect the counted votes. It reminds me of Joseph Stalin’s attributed statement that ‘it’s not the people who vote that count, it’s the people who count the votes’. “Third, about six in 10 (59%) fear that they will become victims of political violence during elections. Consequently, some people vote to ensure ‘peace’ in communities given that 50% of respondents said past elections have led to violence in their neighbourhood. This shows us that without the needed political and democratising reforms, citizens can see elections as a mere ritual that fail to express the people’s will.
“Fourth, the bad performance by Zanu PF does not automatically lead to the transfer of votes to CCC. The CCC has to convince the electorate that it has better socio-economic policies, a more democratic culture and the stamina to govern. Rehashing Zanu PF’s naked failures is not enough.”

Enter Professor Byran Caplan

In 2001, American professor of economics at George Mason University and New York Times bestselling author, Byran Caplan, wrote a groundbreaking book, The Myth of the Rational Voter, named “the best political book of the year” by the New York Times.
In his seminal work, Caplan coins the term “rational irrationality”,
which sounds like an oxymoron, explaining why people make irrational voting choices that end up rationalised as rational.
Caplan says “people tailor their degree of rationality at the costs of error”.
What this means is when there is a low threshold of personal cost in making a certain decision, say during elections and voting, people will stop asking questions and allow themselves to make an irrational choice.
Holding a particular political belief generally has no material cost for individuals who holds it.
His or her own actions, alone, will never determine the outcome of any election.
An average voter usually has the impression that their individual vote doesn’t matter.
Thus, people vote based on party, a single issue, or they get swayed by the rhetoric of one candidate or another.
Essentially their voting choices are not always guided by rationality; driven by logic and reason.
People may vote irrationally driven by following parties, campaign rhetoric or a particular candidate.
This produces what is now called rational irrationality.
The Afro-barometer survey is a good example of a poll whose findings on the presidential and parliamentary elections are based on rational irrationality.
Some voters will continue to hold certain beliefs and make choices they want in an election despite a preponderance of evidence to the contrary showing their choice is irrational. They will rationalise their irrationality, hence Caplan’s rational irrationality.

Rational ignorance

Rational irrationality resonates with rational ignorance which basically means deliberately refraining from seeking or acquiring knowledge when the supposed cost of educating oneself on an issue exceeds the expected potential benefit which that knowledge would provide.
In that case, the individual feels justified to remain ignorant as they would spend more seeking that knowledge than benefitting from it – a cost-benefit-analysis approach to education.
This is rational ignorance similar to rational irrationality in voting. The Afro-barometer survey speaks to this.