Our View: Perceptions, not performance, drive approval ratings

Opinion polls dealing with how people view the way the government is carrying out its job are not reliable indicators. This is because people’s responses are primarily based on perceptions of how government policies are implemented rather through direct experience.

For example, an opinion poll carried out for Politis newspaper showed that the highest approval rating was earned by President Christodoulides’ “digital transformation.” Some 46 per cent of respondents approved of the government’s handling of digital transformation, but is it such a success story?

It is not, because it has been moving very slowly, most state services still use paper documents. The fact that the number of people employed in the state sector keeps increasing is proof that digital transformation is still in its infancy. But people think that the president’s record has been good because they have nothing to compare it with – there has been no digital transformation in the past.

A slightly lower approval rating (43 per cent), but still relatively high, was given for his migration policy on which the government has done exceptionally well, not only drastically cutting the inflow of irregular migrants, but also speeding up procedures for examining asylum applications and deportations. Migration policy has, arguably, been the biggest achievement of this government, but it does not seem to have the approval it deserves for this.

Responses on the matter are affected to an extent by public cynicism. To the question about “the degree to which people believe the migration problem in Cyprus has been solved” only a third believed this to be the case. Two thirds believed “there is still a serious problem,” but unfortunately polls offer no explanations for the responses they record. But we cannot dismiss the fact that the majority of people believe there is a problem. Whether it can be solved or is a problem that we have to learn to live with, the poll did not find out.

Christodoulides’ approval ratings on economic policy and fighting organised crime were more or less the same – a little more than 33 per cent. He has the same approval for an economy that is doing very well and organised crime that the government has not been very effectively dealing with. How can this be explained?

This is probably because most people do not care about budget surpluses and growth rates – they judge the economy on how far their disposable income can go. It is not very far considering the high prices they must deal with. The inflation rate may be low, but prices remain high, making it difficult for many households to make ends meet. These households would not approve of the government’s economic policy.

Approval ratings change, but Christodoulides will have realised that it is on the home front that this will be achieved and not through the alleged foreign policy successes that he loves to talk about.