Anutin expects Bhumjaithai to outdo its 2019 performance in upcoming election
Bhumjaithai Party leader Anutin Charnvirakul on Monday rejected opinion polls, and expressed confidence that his party would win House seats in triple digits.
Anutin, the public health minister in the outgoing government, told reporters that he did not believe results of opinion surveys by other pollsters but trusted his own analysis and surveys.
Anutin was speaking a day after the Nida Poll of the National Institute of Development Administration announced the results of its second election 2023 survey, held from April 3 to 7.
The results showed that Anutin was favoured by only 2.55% of 2,000 respondents nationwide as the next prime minister. Only 3.75% of the respondents said they would vote for Bhumjaithai’s constituency candidates and 3% said they would vote for Bhumjaithai in the party-list election.
Anutin said the 3% number was too low for his party.
“If our party really has only 3% in the popularity rating, we would get only 12 MPs in the upcoming election. Do you think Bhumjaithai would get just 12 MPs?” Anutin asked.
He added that if his party won just 12 House seats as predicted by the survey, he would take responsibility for the poor performance by stepping down as leader and quitting politics.
Anutin said he believed his own estimation because he had expected his party to win 52 seats in the 2019 poll and it won 51 MPs.
“I believe myself,” Anutin said.
He then told the reporter that his silence meant “Yes”.
“We can’t say it out loud because we fear it would be like being disrespectful to the voters to say how many seats we would win,” Anutin said.
He said the campaigns by whistleblower Chuwit Kamolvisit had not affected his party’s popularity and quite to the contrary, it seemed to be rising.
“Our candidates’ popularity is now even more in most constituencies. Initially, we expected a certain number of House seats but after the attacks, we are expecting more House seats,” Anutin said.
