HKU POP SITE releases the latest popularity figures of the HKSAR Government and Donald TsangBack

The Public Opinion Programme (POP) at the University of Hong Kong today releases on schedule via the "HKU POP SITE" (http://hkupop.pori.hk) the last round of popularity figures of Donald Tsang before he resigned to stand for the upcoming election of the Chief Executive, as well as people's satisfaction with the HKSAR Government. As a general practice, all figures have been weighted according to the gender-age distribution of the Hong Kong population obtained from the 2001 Population Census, and are summarized as follows:

* "95% confidence level" means that if we were to repeat a certain survey 100 times, using the same questions each time but with different random samples, we would expect 95 times getting a figure within the error margins specified.
** Collapsed from a 5-point scale.

The latest survey conducted in late May showed that, Acting CE Donald Tsang scored 70.4 marks, and 74% supported him as the Chief Executive. Besides, regarding people's appraisal of the overall performance of the HKSAR Government, the latest figures revealed that 35% were satisfied, whereas 24% were dissatisfied.

Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, analyzed, "Both the popularity rating and approval rate of Donald Tsang have dropped a little, but within the margins of sampling error, in the last two weeks before his technical resignation. The popularity of the government, on the other hand, has continued to increase, as people's satisfaction level has gone back to that of April 1999." Robert Chung also added, "Since Donald Tsang has resigned to prepare for his election campaign, POP has also switched on our CE election polling routine. Our operation will be similar to that of 1996, and that for general elections, subject to modifications according to actual circumstances."

POP's operation in the CE election of 1996 was as follows:

October 18		CH Tung announced his intention to stand for the election

October 23-24		POP conducted a survey on 5 potential candidates

November 2		Preparatory Committee confirmed a list of 8 qualified candidates

November 6-7		POP conducted a survey on 8 qualified candidates

November 15		400-person Selection Committee confirmed 3 candidates after voting,

			namely, CH Tung, TL Yang and Peter Woo

November 18-19		POP conducted a survey on 3 final candidates

December 9		POP conducted the final pre-election survey on 3 final candidates

December 11		Election of the CE by the Selection Committee

POP's normal practice is to release the results of our regular surveys every Tuesday at 2 pm via our POP Site, except during public holidays, each time with a forecast of the items to be released in the forthcoming week. We will review and adjust this operation regularly. The date and time of our next release will be May 31, 2005, Tuesday, at 2 pm, the latest findings of our annual survey on the June Fourth Incident will be released.

Shall anyone have any question regarding the research design of the surveys published in the POP Site, members of the POP Team will be happy to answer them, but we will not further comment on the findings. Shall any person or journalist have any other questions, please email them to us at <[email protected]>. The Director of Public Opinion Programme would answer them as soon as possible. We will keep such an arrangement under constant review, suggestions most welcome. Please note that everything carried in the POP Site does not represent the stand of the University of Hong Kong. Dr Robert Ting-Yiu Chung, Director of Public Opinion Programme, is responsible for everything posted herewith, except for column articles which represent the stand of their authors.