“How did Time conduct this opinion poll? How many respondents were polled and where do these respondents live?
“Is Time saying that Najib and the other four world leaders are less popular than Trump in Terengganu and Kelantan or in New York City?” he said in his blog today.
Hillary Clinton is supposed to be more popular than Donald Trump, and even former president Barack Obama supported her, but Trump still won the presidency, he said.
“And Time voted Anwar Ibrahim the man-of-the-year and more popular than (Dr) Mahathir (Mohamad) but yet Mahathir won the 1999 general election.”
Salleh said the so-called Time opinion poll is not relevant to Malaysian politics and will not really sway public opinion as those who support the opposition, or otherwise, are not going to shift just because Time says Trump is more popular than Najib outside the town of Pekan.
According to Time, besides Najib, the other “less popular leaders” are Nicolas Maduro (president of Venezuela), Jacob Zuma (president of South Africa), Michel Temer (president of Brazil) and Alexis Tsipras (prime minister of Greece).