Poll: Morsi approval hits record low

Egyptian opinion poll sees record low in presidential job performance approval rating, yet not all citizens know who the opposition is nor who they would want to replace Morsi

Egyptians show increasing dissatisfaction with President Mohamed Morsi, with his approval rating hitting a record low of 47 percent, according to the latest public opinion poll conducted by The Egyptian Centre for Public Opinion Research (Baseera).
This approval rating is even lower than the approval at the end of Morsi's first eight months in office, which was 49 percent and way behind the 78 percent approval he earned after the first 100 days.
Baseera not only polls citizens on approval, but also on disapproval.
In this one - nine months after Morsi was sworn into office - the percentage of those who disapprove of his performance rose to 45 percent, compared to 43 percent at the end of his first eight months in office, and shot up after only 15 percent disapproved of Morsi after his first 100 days in presidency.
The poll, which was conducted in late March, shows that Morsi's job approval rate declines significantly among respondents with a university degree or post-graduate degree, of whom 39 percent see his performance as positive, compared to 51 percent among respondents with a secondary (high school) degree or less.
Only 37 percent of respondents who would vote for Morsi if presidential elections were to be held tomorrow are down from a significant 58 percent after the first 100 days. Two-thirds of respondents were unable to name an alternative, however.
Eight percent of the respondents favoured Ahmed Shafiq, the former presidential candidate and the ousted president's last prime minister, while only 3 percent said that they favoured a military man, whether it be Defence Minister General Abdel Fattah El-Sisi or any other. All other popular figures received less support in the poll.
On Egyptian's political awareness
A third of those polled never heard of the National Salvation Front (NSF), the country's main opposition coalition, according to the poll.
This percentage was almost the same in last month's opinion poll and from among those only 30 percent said they support it, compared to 35 percent in last month's poll.
Forty-nine percent said they perceived the NSF performance negatively, compared to 42 percent last month.
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Furthermore, 39 percent of Egyptians never heard of the appeal court's decision on 27 March to reinstate Abdel Meguid Mahmoud, the prosecutor-general that was edged out by a unilateral constitutional decree on the part of Islamist President Morsi.
The decision also annulled the appointment by Morsi of current Prosecutor-General Talaat Abdullah. Forty-one percent of respondents see that the best solution is for the Supreme Judicial Council, Egypt's highest judicial authority, to nominate three candidates for Morsi to choose from for the prosecutor-general position, as the constitution dictates.
Eighteen percent, however, see that the solution is to enable Mahmoud to return to his post. Only 14 percent favour the current chief prosecutor to stay put in his post. The remaining respondents couldn't come up with a solution for the problem.
The poll was conducted through telephone interviews among 2,202 respondents ages 18+ on 27 and 28 March 2013. The response rate was approximately 73 percent and error margin below 3 percent. Income brackets were determined based on ownership of durable goods.
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