Survey: Over two in three give nod to Perikatan’s Covid-19 response

KUALA LUMPUR, April 24 — Public critics of Perikatan Nasional (PN) over its handling of the Covid-19 pandemic appeared to be a vocal minority, as an Invoke survey found the majority of respondents to approve.

In the survey commissioned by Malay Mail, 69 per cent of respondents polled in February of 2021 said they were satisfied with Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin and the PN government’s performance in dealing with the pandemic.

However, this was a decline from 75 per cent of respondents polled in December 2020, prior to the implementation of MCO2.0 in January 2021.

By community, Malay approval went from 90 per cent in July to 76 per cent in January while the Indian community’s approval dipped from 72 per cent to 63 per cent.

The Chinese community showed the least decline, going from 56 per cent to 54 per cent over the same period.

“Most worryingly for the incumbent, Malay satisfaction with the Federal Government’s performance dropped an eye watering 21 [percentage points] between July 2020 to early January 2021 — a catastrophic turn of events for a government that claims legitamacy from being the defenders of Malay Muslim interest,’’ Invoke said of the result.

The survey also showed a rise in positive sentiment towards the PN administration at the beginning of the year following the Emergency declaration and an reintroduction of the movement control order or MCO2.0.

Invoke cautioned against taking the sentiment to be approval of the government’s policies, however, when noting the anomalous result.

“Going by the earlier economic indicators, namely the spike in the economic pessimism after the implementation of MCO2.0, the sudden surge in Federal Government’s approval rating had nothing to do with public support for the aforementioned policy,” said the survey.

The Invoke survey, titled “Uncharted Territory”, polled 7,860 registered voters between December 18, 2020 and February, 21, 2021. 

The survey was commissioned with two overall objectives: to gauge voter sentiments six months after the formation of the unelected PN government and to measure resentment over the “subversion of the people’s mandate.”