If you had the opportunity to share a bucket of chicken and some cornmeal pudding with either Portia Simpson Miller or her rival Bruce Golding, whom would you choose?

Well 50 per cent of people who participated in a recent Gleaner-commissioned poll said they would rather go out to lunch with the PNP president. To the same question, 25 per cent said they would prefer eating with Golding. Those who were undecided or refused to answer accounted for the remaining 25 per cent.

When the same people were asked to choose one of the two as a travelling companion for a journey in a car from Kingston to Montego Bay, 50 per cent chose Simpson Miller while 27 per cent said they would rather take the ride with Golding.

Of those who would rather travel with the Prime Minister, 30 per cent said they made that decision because they felt more comfortable with women and 19 per cent said they felt she was friendlier and easier to talk to than Golding. Twelve per cent said that they would choose her simply because their only option was Bruce Golding and they neither like him nor the party he leads.

Travelling with Golding

Of those who would choose Mr. Golding as a travelling companion, 22 per cent said it was because they liked him while 15 per cent said it was only because they don't like the PNP.

Meanwhile, 30 per cent of those who would choose Mr. Golding said they would do so because they think that he's smart, friendly, a good conversationalist and has good plans and ideas.

The poll, with a margin of error of plus or minus three per cent, was done on June 18 and 19 in 84 communities across Jamaica's 14 parishes by pollster Bill Johnson and his team of researchers.