Renowned Ghanaian Pollster Ben Ephson bas admitted getting it wrong on his predicted outcome of the Assin North by-election which featured NDC’s James Gyakye Quayson, Charles Opoku of the New Patriotic Party (NPP), and Bernice Enyonam Sefenu of the Liberal Party of Ghana (LPG).
He blamed the incorrect verdict on the representative sample his team surveyed during the poll.
Mr. Ephson had projected that Charles Opoku of the New Patriotic Party would triumph over James Gyakye Quayson of the National Democratic Congress.
However, speaking on Metro TV after provisional results put the NDC Parliamentary Candidate ahead, Mr. Ephson said voters in swing
“You can get it wrong we did it wrong mainly in the swing polling stations, areas and I think that we got it wrong because we do representative samples we can’t do every polling, voter.
The Managing Editor of the Daily Dispatch newspaper further switched to defending mode and tout his achievement as a pollster.
“In the polling business 22 years I don’t have 100 % [record]. In 22 years, I got 83% right. When you do polls you get it wrong and find out what went wrong. For example, in 2016, it got it wrong. In 2020, I looked at what happened in 2016 I perfected my art in the general election, and in 2020, I said [John] Mahama will lose by five hundred thousand votes. He lost by 5014000. I said NDC will get most of the 32 seats it lost. It won 30 of the 32 seats. When you go on and get it wrong you access what happened then you move on,” Mr. Ephson said.
“You don’t need a license to do polls,” he added.
The veteran pollster stated that by-elections and internal executive party elections are difficult to predict, explaining that pollsters have to survey the delegates.
“What most people don’t know is the most polls to do are events like by-elections or party executive elections. They’re the most difficult because if you’re doing party chairman or party general secretary [elections] you would have to get the delegates to survey.
“If you are doing general election you look at the polling station results and work in areas where the two parties get between 40-45%. These are swing areas So the more difficult ones are positions of executives of political parties and single event by-election,” he noted.
Following Tuesday, June 27, Assin North by-election, the Electoral Commission declared James Gyakye Quayson the winner.
He polled 17,245 votes representing 57.56 percent of the total valid votes cast.
Charles Opoku polled 12,630 votes representing 42.15 percent of the total votes cast while the LPG’s Bernice Enyonam Sefenu polled 87 votes representing 0.29%.
