Williams and Associates, the United States-based polling firm hired by the Goodluck Jonathan administration ahead of the 2015 elections but which predicted victory for Muhammadu Buhari has predicted the latter’s defeat in the forthcoming presidential polls.

In its analysis of Nigerian presidential election, the company tipped Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to win with less than a majority of the votes cast with 45 percent while Buhari will take 33 per cent of the votes.

The polling sample also predicted that Kingsley Moghalu, the candidate of Young Peoples Party (YPP) would get 9 per cent of the votes with Omoyele Sowore of the African Action Congress (AAC) getting 8 percent of the votes.

When the company was hired by the Jonathan administration 1n 2015, it predicted victory for Buhari with 54 percent of the votes to Jonathan’s 46 percent. Buhari eventually beat Jonathan by 54 to 45 per cent of the total votes cast.

The analysis worked with data collected across Nigeria by operatives of the company through interviews, face to face interviews and using multi-stage stratifications proportionate in English and other local dialects as appropriate.

The poll also reported that the South-East region with 76 percent, had the greatest proportion of Nigerians who believe that things were going in the wrong direction. Only 12 per cent of those in the region believed that things were going in the right direction.

The South-East was followed by the South-South with 70 percent, the North-East with 65 percent, North-West with 57 percent, South-West 48 percent while the troubled North-Central with 46 percent remarkably had the least proportion of those who believe that things were wrong.

Two weeks to the election, 64 percent of the sample responded that Buhari had not done enough to deserve re-election as compared to the 52 percent which in the same time in 2015 believed that Jonathan had not done enough to deserve re-election.