Belize Network of N.G.O.’s Launches I.C.J. Online Survey
As the I.C.J. Referendum campaign intensifies, the Belize Network of N.G.O.’s launched an online I.C.J. survey last week Thursday. The aim of the survey according to N.G.O. Senator Osmany Salas is to gather data on the perspectives of Belizeans on Guatemala’s claim to Belize. The survey primarily targets the online Belizean community with twelve short answers. Senator Salas says that the survey will be deployed in one-month intervals to create time-based snapshots of public opinion and capture details on how public opinion changes per period. After being analyzed, the data collected is expected to provide guidance on the different methods that should be implemented to disseminate information related to the Public Awareness Campaign.
Osmany Salas
Osmany Salas, N.G.O. Senator
“For us at this stage, it is more important to get a sense of what people as opposed to how they will vote. We do have a question related to that but for us, that is not the important thing at this time. At this time it is for us to see how people are thinking and where they are getting their information. So as a network we expect that this will help us to determine how effective the activities have started countrywide to educate the voting public and to give a sense where there needs to be a bigger push to get the information out.”
Hipolito Novelo
“How true can the information gathered be? Because since it is online, I can pretend to be someone else and give my opinion. Someone else from another part of the country, if they know about the website, they can say whatever they want. How true is the information?”
Osmany Salas
“We can say that is a flaw of the survey but like I said for us the important thing is the perception. The important thing is people’s opinion on the claim. So we have a couple of fields that we did not just ask people to tick a particular choice but also to include what they are thinking and what their views are and we are getting some very interesting comments that we will be able to sort these and by Thursday we will have some information to share.”
The survey is being administered by Aldair Gongora, a Belizean Ph.D. Candidate at Boston University. All the data collected will be anonymous. The link to the survey can be found on our website: channel5Belize.com.
