ISurvey: PM most trusted leader by 9.6 points, Busuttil jumps 10 points in six months

Helena Grech Prime Minister Joseph Muscat remains the nation’s most trust leader by a staggering 9.6 percentage points, despite Opposition Leader Simon Busuttil’s trust rating climbing 10 percentage points in just six months.

The Malta Independent’s latest edition of the iSurvey shows that despite the very serious allegations surrounding Dr Muscat and the current magisterial inquiry into those same allegations, he remains the most trusted leader by a long shot.

Six hundred respondents were interviewed by telephone for this iSurvey between 25 April and 3 May. One could argue that the allegations have yet to sink into people’s minds or that these have been largely ignored.

Respondents were asked one simple question: Which party leader do you trust the most? Overall, 48.1 per cent of respondents chose Prime Minister Muscat, 38.5 per cent chose Opposition Leader Busuttil, and 13.2 per cent said neither.

Dr Busuttil is making honesty, credibility and transparency the cornerstone of his campaign, which therefore goes to show the uphill battle he faces in the four-week run up to the snap election being held on 3 June.

The Prime Minister bore the brunt of allegations about his wife’s ownership of Egrant Inc., the third company named in the Panama Papers scandal, on 20 April, and the snap election been called on 1 May.

When taking into consideration the 57.8 per cent of respondents who cited corruption, the Panama Papers scandal, lies and political instability as being a top concern, the trust ratings point to a nation that is troubled by the current political climate as well as the current political leaders.

Neither enjoys more than half of the respondents’ trust as they are campaign to lead the nation. The situation could be perceived as worse for Dr Muscat considering that he came into power with an unprecedented victory of 36,000 more votes than former Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi just four years ago.

PN and PL voter split

Turning to how respondents voted in the 2013 general election, PL voters gave Dr Muscat a trust rating of 82.3 per cent, Dr Busuttil a trust rating of 7.5 per cent and 10.3 per cent went to neither.

PN voters, on the other hand gave Dr Muscat a trust rating of six per cent, Dr Busuttil received a trust rating of 78.3 per cent while 15.7 per cent went to neither.

When compared with the November 2016 edition of the iSurvey, PL voters’ trust in the Prime Minister dipped slightly by 0.9 percentage points, while their trust in Dr Busuttil also dipped by 2.2 percentage points. This would indicate that a small proportion of PL voters had lost some faith in their party leader which was not translated into an increase of trust in the Opposition Leader.

As for PN voters, their trust in Dr Muscat has fallen by four percentage points – from 10 per cent in November to six per cent now. However, it must be noted that the lowest ever levels of trust placed in the Prime Minister by PN voters was in April 2016 when he received a trust rating of just 4.2 per cent. This was when the Panama Papers scandal was initially revealed.

Dr Muscat and the Labour Party received the worst overall scores out of the iSurveys conducted by this newsroom since April 2016, both from PN and PL voters. This indicates that the international spotlight on Malta, and the concrete black on white evidence of in the Panama Papers made available by the International Consortium of International Journalists (ICIJ), had a much bigger impact on the electorate than the arguably far more serious allegations being levelled now, against the Prime Minister and his family no less, by journalist and blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia.

In April of last year, it was revealed that Minister without Portfolio Konrad Mizzi and the Prime Minister’s chief of staff Keith Schembri both had a Panama based company sheltered by a trust in New Zealand. Documentation backing this up was made through a massive leak of documents from Mossack Fonseca, a Panama based law firm, to a German newspaper. Confidential e-mails between Nexia BT, the local company headed by Brian Tonna, who facilitated the setting up of the complicated financial structures, exposed Dr Mizzi and Mr Schembri’s companies as well as a third company – Egrant Inc. The full allegations made just weeks ago about Egrant Inc can be found in the lead iSurvey story of this edition of The Malta Independent on Sunday.

Trust rating from 1-10

In addition to an either/or trust question, respondents were asked to state how much they trusted each party leader on a scale of one to 10 – with 10 signifying the greatest level of trust, and one the lowest.

Overall, Dr Muscat received an average trust score of six points, while Dr Busuttil received an average score of 4.7 points. Dr Muscat’s mean trust score increased by .1 of a decimal point, while the Opposition Leader’s decreased by the same amount. As expected, those who voted PL in 2013 gave Dr Muscat an average trust score of 8.5 while Dr Busuttil received a score of 2.9.

Conversely, 2013 PN voters gave Dr Muscat a trust score of 2.6, and Dr Busuttil received a score of 7.4.

It must be said that Dr Busuttil is clawing his way back from an abysmal trust score of 5.27 awarded to him by 2013 PN voters in November, to a score of 7.4 at present. This shows the significant strides he has made within his party is in line with the equally large increase in trust when respondents were asked to choose between the two leaders.