Friday, March 16, 2007

Baghdad poll numbers show low confidence in security, government

Politics
WASHINGTON - A confidential poll for the Iraq government shows Baghdad citizens harbor a bleak outlook for future security, while Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki suffers low job-approval ratings.

The door-to-door survey of more than 4,000 residents in Baghdad Province in mid-February showed only 3 percent of respondents said security had improved in their neighborhoods in the past three months. Just 10 percent said it will improve in the next three months.

Baghdad is the central focus of President Bush’s Jan. 10 reinforcement plan of more than 25,000 troops to quell sectarian and terrorist violence.

“These numbers are bad,” said a U.S. Army source, who read the poll results to The Examiner on condition of anonymity. “They are all in the tank.”

The Independent Institute for Administration and Civil Society Studies, an Iraqi firm, conducted the poll for the al-Maliki government. Al-Maliki uses the numbers to assess public support for his policies.

There is a caveat, the Army source said. Surveyors went door to door at a time when the new counterinsurgency plan had just begun. The military reports that attacks declined in March, a trend that could bring higher numbers in the next government-sponsored poll.

“We changed strategy in part to address these issues in the poll,” the Army source said.

The United States worries that a lack of public confidence in security measures could mean residents are less likely to cooperate in providing tips on insurgent activity.

But Brookings Institution military analyst Michael O’Hanlon said poor polls numbers do not always translate that way.

“Even if people are somewhat pessimistic, it doesn’t mean they will refuse to help or actively oppose the effort,” he said. “It’s just as likely that they will hope to be proven wrong in their sentiments and give Maliki and the surge another chance.”

The survey addressed issues such as security, government approval and Shiite militias.

Al-Maliki’s job approval stood at 34 percent, down from 45 percent last September before waves of Sunni-Shiite violence rocked the capital. The number, however, was an uptick from the prime minister’s 25 percent rating in December.

On security, 32 percent of citizens considered their neighborhoods secure, compared with 43 percent in September.

In a bright spot for al-Maliki, who says he has tried to curtail militias and associated death squads, only 23 percent of residents believe those paramilitaries make Baghdad safer, as opposed to 32 percent in September.

rscarborough@dcexaminer.com

Examiner

No comments: