The governing Jamaica Labour Party (JLP) has an 18-point lead in favourability rating over the Opposition People’s National Party (PNP) among voters surveyed in the Portland Eastern constituency by veteran pollster Bill Johnson earlier this month.

That 18-point advantage is also reflected in the constituents’ view that the JLP would do a better job than the PNP of governing the country.

The poll, commissioned by the Jamaica Observer, was conducted March 1 – 2 in the constituency where campaigning is on in earnest for a parliamentary by-election scheduled for April 4 to fill the vacancy created by the murder of Dr Lynvale Bloomfield.

Bloomfield was found dead in his Passley Gardens house in the parish on February 2.

Johnson, whose team of researchers questioned 480 constituents, said the poll has a sampling error of plus or minus 4.5 per cent.

When the pollsters asked people to say if they have a favourable or unfavourable opinion of the parties, 44 per cent of respondents said they had a favourable opinion of the JLP to 26 per cent for the PNP.

Of those who had an unfavourable opinion of the parties, 30 per cent said the JLP, 46 per cent said the PNP, while those who said they were not sure amounted to 26 per cent JLP and 28 per cent PNP.

Asked which of the two parties they thought would do the best job of governing the country now, 42 per cent of respondents said the JLP, 24 per cent said the PNP, 28 per cent were undecided, while six per cent refused to answer.