Vice President Jejomar C. Binay overtook everybody at 27 percent, way ahead of Sen. Grace Poe’s 21 percent and Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago’s 18 percent in the Philcoman Research Institute Inc.’s (PCMRII) platform-based survey conducted quietly at the start of the presidential campaign.
Trailing behind them are Manuel A. Roxas II with 16 percent and Rodrigo R. Duterte with 15 percent.
Founded in 1954, Philcoman, later revitalized as PCMRII, is a nationwide non-governmental federation of professional and technological societies, management development institutions, academe, business enterprises and professional managers dedicated to the development of management and improvement of management practices in all aspects of Philippine society.
Dr. Ernie Gonzales, a fellow of the London School of Economics and Political Science and PCMRII director for Research, said their field researchers had asked 1,200 respondents at random whom they would vote for president if elections were held on schedule on four important issues: social, political, economics and national security.
“The PCMRII survey differs from the usual popularity survey conducted by other research organizations. Ours is a nationalist, policy-oriented research study, where respondents are asked who of the candidates they think have concrete plans for the country based on the four interrelated important issues,” said Gonzales, a post graduate interdisciplinary professor at University of the Philippines-Manila and the University of Santo Tomas.
Simply stated, Binay was the choice of 27 percent of 1,200 respondents; Poe, 21 percent; Santiago, 18 percent; Roxas, 16 percent; and Duterte, 15 percent; with 3 percent out of the respondents still undecided. The sampling errors for national percentages is 3 percent, plus or minus; six for regionals; and the same for metropolitan Manila. With such margins of error, Santiago, Roxas and Duterte are practically tied for the third place, each with no socioeconomics and national security platforms so far.
Each percentage point is equivalent to 440,000 votes, assuming 44 million of the 54 million registered voters cast their ballot on May 9 as ordained by the Constitution. Of the presidential candidates, Binay is the only one with clearly defined platforms on the issues of political, social, economics and, in particular, national security, where he showed his expertise and policies on antiterrorism and cybercrime, which his office put into action in a series of seminars at the start of his term.
On the persistent issues of plunder and corruption, largely sourced from the one-sided Senate, Ombudsman and Commission on Audit investigations, which fall under socioeconomics, most respondents believed that Binay had merely been subjected to prejudgment of guilt by his political enemies to lessen his popularity among the masses and the middle class.
Senator Poe is highly admired among well-to-do respondents, but has no anti-poverty, socioeconomics and national security platforms.
Meanwhile, Sen. Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. topped other vice presidentiables with 31 percent over Sen. Chiz Escudero’s 24 percent, Sen. Gregorio B. Honasan’s 16 percent, Rep. Leni Robredo’s 13 percent, Sen. Allan Cayetano’s 10 percent and Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV’s 6 percent.
The issue against Poe is her being pro-oligarch and her lack of concrete socioeconomics and national security platforms; Santiago is popular among women and voting-age students, but her health is pulling her down; Roxas, according to most respondents, is pro-elite and has no concrete platforms for the masses; and Duterte, for his being confrontational and tendency to put the law in his hands, has not offered a concrete socioeconomics plan at all.
In the vice-presidential race, Marcos is the only one offering concrete solutions to the problem of graft and corruption, the Mindanao problem, the worsening crime situation, foreign affairs, and was cited for having brought the campaign to a high state of civility.
Apart from this, Marcos drew sympathy from majority of the respondents when leftists and some known elitists excessively launched an anti-Marcos campaign. Honasan surprisingly increased his standing from other surveys among the vice presidentiables when members of the Reform the Armed Forces Movement (RAM), now an accredited party-list organization, and thousands of Guardians throughout the country, who are known for their nationalistic advocacies for social and economic reform, showed their unequivocal support after the start of the official 45-day campaign period.
In the senatorial race, incumbent Sen. Vicente Sotto III led the survey with 51 percent, followed by Sen. Ralph Recto with 49 percent, Rep. Martin Romualdez of Leyte, 48 percent; Dick Gordon, 47 percent; Ping Lacson, 45 percent; Senate President Frank Drilon, 43 percent; Rep. Manny Pacquiao of Sarangani, 41 percent; Sen. Teofisto Guingona, 39 percent; Sen. Serge Osmeña, 37 percent; Sen. Migz Zubiri, 36 percent; former Sen. Francis Pangilinan, 35 percent; former Technical Education and Skills Development Authority Director General Joel Villanueva, 31 percent; Rep. Neri Colmenares, 26 percent; Risa Hontiveros, 22 percent; and former Metropolitan Manila Development Authority chairman Francis Tolentino, 21 percent.
The PCMRII will release its next survey result to the media and on its web site by mid-April, and the last one will be announced on May 2, including its findings on the series of presidential debates.
To reach the writer, e-mail cecilio.arillo@gmail.com.
2 comments
Is this a JOKE? Binay ahead? Unbelievable! Tell it to the marines!
well so much for Philcoman Research Institute Inc. being regraded as any type of credible organisation if it came up with these results let alone being a non political organisation.