Eight in 10 Kenyans are hopeful that the New Year 2023 will bring forth good tidings while slightly more than half rated 2022 as a terrible year, a new poll report shows.
According to the end-of-year poll report released by Infotrak Research and Consulting, 82 per cent of Kenyans are optimistic about 2023.
Of those that are most hopeful about the New Year, they look forward to the resolution of key issues of concern including the high cost of living, unemployment and access to quality healthcare.
A total of 52 per cent of Kenyans want the rising cost of living tackled on a priority basis. Forty-two per cent of Kenyans want unemployment tackled, 22 per cent desire the infrastructure to be improved and 16 per cent say corruption is the most urgent thing to be addressed in the New Year.
Kenyans living in North Eastern, Rift Valley and Central Kenya, in that order, have the highest optimism levels about 2023 while those in Western, Nyanza, Nairobi and Coast, in that order, are less optimistic about the New Year.
At the same time, more than half per cent of Kenyans rated 2022 as a bad year. Kenyans from the Nyanza, Western, Coast and Nairobi regions thought 2022 was a bad year. More than 50 per cent of Kenyans residing in those regions rated it as a bad year.
On the flip side, those from North Eastern and a section from the Coast rated it as an excellent year, while those in the Rift Valley and Nairobi and Eastern rated 2022 as an average year.
In terms of gender, 52 per cent of females rated 2022 as a bad year while 48 per cent of men rated it as a bad year.
Ms Angela Ambitho, the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Infotrak said although 2022 was a year with new challenges for Kenyans, most of them remained resilient.
“It has been a very active year where we had a hotly contested general election. Kenyans have had to deal with a lot of challenges revolving around economic hardships due to the rising cost of living and climate change. But we still see the resilience spirit that is common among Kenyans,” Ms Ambitho said.
The issues facing Kenyans have still remained almost the same as compared to a similar poll carried out in December 2021.
In 2021, Kenyans complained about the high rates of unemployment, high cost of living and access to healthcare.
In 2022, the issues changed in priority but remained the same with the rising cost of living emerging as the biggest issue of concern followed by unemployment and access to healthcare.
The least issues of concern for Kenyans include tribalism (3 per cent), electrification (3 per cent), equal distribution of resources (4 per cent), the cost of doing business (4 per cent), bad politics (3 per cent) and empowerment of women (9 per cent).
In order to make Kenyans happy moving forward to 2023, the administration of President William Ruto needs to focus on addressing the high cost of living, unemployment and access to quality and affordable healthcare.
“Kenyans want the government to address the cost of unga , the cost of fuel, cost of housing and other things that are basic for Kenyans. They also want the government to tackle the problem of unemployment and access to affordable healthcare,” Ms Ambitho added.
Kenyans staying in the Rift Valley region are the most concerned about the rising cost of living at 58 per cent followed by those in Nairobi (57 per cent) and Western (57 per cent) and Central (56 per cent). Those in North Eastern and Eastern are least concerned.
The poll carried out between 21st and 22nd December 2022 involved 840 adult Kenyans drawn from 47 counties and eight regions in the country.
It was carried out through Computer Assisted Telephone Interviews (CATI) with a 95 per cent degree of confidence.
