Top agenda

Inflation, corruption and education are the three top issues that the voters think the government should pay highest attention. Interestingly, the number of those who think fighting corruption should be the top agenda has almost doubled from last year.

However, despite the prevailing high inflation rate, 27 percent said it needs the greatest attention of the government against last year's 38 percent.

When asked what are the areas that the government has already taken actions in, the highest 42.8 percent said they see steps taken in education followed by power (21 percent), trial of war criminals (18.1 percent) and corruption (16.6 percent).


Law and order

For the first time, the people's perception about the law and order situation has dipped. 32.9 percent think the situation has deteriorated over the year as against only 20 percent last year.

On the other hand, fewer people now think favourably about the law and order as 41.2 percent think the situation has improved as against 55 percent last year.

Also 28.2 percent said law and order is the weakest point of the government, putting it in the third place of weaknesses.


Judiciary is more politically biased

People's perception about the judiciary has dipped over the past year as more people think it is politically influenced. Last year, 40 percent said they think judiciary is politically biased and this year 53.2 percent think so.

Again, less people now think judiciary is free and independent with a 32.1 percent saying so against last year's 40 percent.


People appreciate power initiatives

More people now appreciate initiatives to improve power supply and less people are critical about it. This is reflective of the government's crash programme on power. Last year, 38 percent felt that enough initiatives have been taken on power sector. This year, this number has gone up to 42 percent. On the other hand, last year 29 percent viewed that initiatives had not been taken and this year this number has gone down to 22.7 percent.


Graft perception dips too

More people are now concerned about corruption. 45 percent of the respondents feel that corruption has increased over the year against 31 percent last year. Correspondingly less people now think graft has decreased. Last year, 47 percent felt that corruption has decreased, this year the figure has shrunk to only 34.5 percent.

Half the respondents think that the grassroots workers of the AL are involved in corruption.

Despite such high perception, only 23.7 percent said they had personally experienced graft. The highest number of them said they faced corruption with police.

Interestingly, in the past one year, people's perception about the Anti-corruption Commission has improved. 36 percent now think it is controlled by the government against last year's 51 percent. 26.7 percent think it is working properly against last year's paltry 10 percent.


Opposition shed negative image

The BNP and its allies have quite impressively shed their negative image in politics. Last year, 30 percent had a negative view about the opposition politics. This time, only 20 percent said so. On the other hand, the number of people who hold a positive view about their politics remained static.

 

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