Ipsos Synovate Poll Indicates 40% of Debate Watchers Will Vote for Uhuru, 33% for Raila

Ipsos Synovate senior researcher Tom Wolf

According to a phone survey conducted by Ipsos Synovate after the Kenya presidential debate, 40% of the Kenyans who watched the debate said they will vote for Jubilee Aliance’s Uhuru Kenyatta in the March 4th elections, while 33% said they will vote for CORD’s Raila Odinga. 7% of the respondents said they will vote for Peter Kenneth of the Eagle Alliance, 4% for Amani’s Musalia Mudavadi, and 2% for Martha Karua. 7% of the respondents were still undecided while 6% did not respond to the survey.

On debate performance, 37% of the respondents thought Uhuru won the debate while 23% thought Odinga performed best.

The survey was conducted on a sample of 1074 Kenyans who watched the debate. Ipsos Synovate senior researcher Tom Wolf however cautioned that the survey was not scientific as it was only conducted among those who watched the debate and should therefore not be used to make a conclusion on the candidate who is leading nationally. The intention of the survey according to him was to measure which candidates the debate watchers are leaning towards.