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Hillary Mageka @hillarymageka

Health workers, the media, President Uhuru Kenyatta and religious organisations were yesterday ranked as heroes of 2020 as the police, Parliament and county governments were rated as worst performers.

According to the polls released yesterday, health workers were rated the best performers, with a mean score of 70 per cent, followed by the media at 60 per cent, with the President (46 per cent), and religious organisations at (45 per cent) .

The pollster also showed that 42 per cent of Kenyans feel that health workers were the heroes of 2020, with 12 per cent of the sampled population saying President Uhuru was their hero.

Running the economy

“42 percent of the surveyed respondents voted for health workers as their heroes of 2020,” Infotrack said in a statement.

Eleven per cent of Kenyans, according to the poll, feel the Ministry of Health was their hero while 10 per cent saying Deputy President William Ruto was their hero.

Six per cent of Kenyans felt Retired Chief Justice David Maraga was their hero, with the church and ODM leader Raila Odinga given four per cent approval by Kenyans.

Further, according to the poll, majority of Kenyans feel that the government did not do a good job of running the economy in 2020 that was largely ravaged by Covid-19 pandemic.

A similar percentage feel the government did not do well in running the economy, with 30 per cent saying the government did well.

However, 42 per cent are confident that the government will do better in 2021.

This even as 61 per cent of Kenyans are optimistic that 2021 will be a better year than 2020; of these 27 per cent believe the economy will improve.

“Kenyans in Rift Valley, Nairobi and Western are least satisfied with governments running of the economy in 2020,”the statement said.

It adds:  “Optimism that the government will do a good job with the economy is highest in North Eastern at 65 per cent and Coast 45 per cent,”

And in what could send the government back to the drawing board, nearly two-thirds of Kenyans indicted President Uhuru Kenyatta administration’s handling of the economy as they decry the lifting of the Covid 19 tax reliefs by the government.

Majority of Kenyans at 67 percent do not support the government’s decision to lift the Covid-19 tax relief measures, the poll says.

“With the exception of North Eastern and Coast regions, only 3 in 10 Kenyans in the other regions support the Ggovernment’s decision to lift tax relief measures,” the pollster stated.

The tax relief measures that took effect in April to cushion people from the effects of the pandemic ended on December 31 last year. At least 47 per cent of Kenyans believe the government’s performance in handling the pandemic has been average.

Only 22 per cent of Kenyans think the performance has been excellent.

“28 per cent of Kenyans believe the government’s performance in the handling the pandemic has been poor while two per cent do not have a position whether the government has done any job.”

The research was conducted between December 27 and 29 last year. Some 800 respondents aged 18 years and above were sampled