“It’s unproductive to prolong disagreements over surveys,” he told FMT. “I will not make an issue of it.”
He said he would leave the interpretation of the results to anyone who wished to do so. “I just presented the findings as they are,” he added.
Rafizi is the founder of Invoke.
According to the survey, which listed nine opposition leaders as possible prime minister, Anwar led with 23.5% of the votes, followed by PAS president Abdul Hadi Awang with 17.6%.
PPBM chairman Mahathir Mohamad came in third with 16.5%. PPBM president Muhyiddin Yassin got 12.6% of the votes, followed by Rafizi (10.7%), PPBM deputy president Mukhriz Mahathir (8.4%), PKR president Wan Azizah Ismail (4.5%), PKR deputy president Mohamed Azmin Ali (3.5%) and PKR vice-president Nurul Izzah Anwar (2.6%).
Rafizi announced the results on Wednesday. The survey subsequently came under fire from several quarters who criticised its methodology.
Rafizi had earlier said the survey was carried out over more than three months, involving 2.8 million voters contacted through computerised telephone calls. From this, 18,000 responded, but 34.4% did not give answers.
This means that about 11,500 of the 2.8 million, or less than 0.7%, answered questions in the survey.
According to PPBM policy and strategy bureau chairman Rais Hussin, the response rate was too low to be used to gauge the views of voters in general.
He asked how Invoke had picked the 2.8 million and questioned the absence of a clear explanation of the demographic details of the respondents, such as their distribution according to state, sex and age, even though there was disclosure of their racial backgrounds.
Mahathir dismissed the survey as insignificant, saying anyone could be a candidate. He added that none of those in the survey would be prime minister if the opposition did not win the general election.
Rafizi did not respond to Rais’s concerns over methodology, but he appeared to welcome further scrutiny of the survey.
“Invoke surveys are not PKR’s, and we can be audited because the interviews are recorded,” he said.
Ivy Chong contributed to this article.