OF SUBSTANCE AND SPIRIT
If we go by what the surveys are saying, the possible results of the May 2022 presidential election may at best be mixed. Abstracting from their sampling designs, surveys convey different narratives. The major surveys seem to show that former Senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is the clear winner. But assessing the results of some broadsheet surveys and surveys conducted in various universities seems to indicate that Vice-President Leni Robredo is the next head of this Republic. Google trends, a good predictor of voter interest, also suggests preference for Leni.
Everyone does agree that survey results simply mirror the sample covered and the dynamics of the period captured during their conduct. Marcos Jr. enjoys some advantage. While protesting his loss in the 2016 vice-presidential election, his handlers spent time expanding his exposure in social media. But fact checkers also emerged and have become more vigilant in exposing the grand design to revise history and crawl back to power.
As Sheila Coronel of Columbia University eloquently put it during her 2022 Adrian Cristobal Lecture Series entitled Marcos and Memory: The Past in our Future, “Marcos is dead and finally buried but we are still struggling with his legacy. Like a hungry ghost, he lays claim to our memories, torments our dreams, and feeds on our hopes.” The handlers of Marcos Jr. have tons to explain, and the survey results could be one of the silent witnesses.
For more information, it should be useful to consider what big data would advise. We can search for insights from those data that are supposed to be of greater variety, available in increasing volumes and coming in with more velocity.
While we don’t have the software to do big data analytics, we can be selective and focus more on data that are readily available.
One such data point is the number of groups that continue to come out in the open to express support to their candidates. Outside of those local government officials with traditional links to the Marcoses, we have seen limited support in traditional or social media to the Marcos son.
On the other hand, the list of supporters of Vice-President Leni continues to increase. 1Sambayan, the biggest coalition of the civic, religious, urban poor, military and professionals with extensive experience in government and business, endorsed the Vice-President prior to her announcement that she was running. 1Sambayan has also strong chapters all over the Philippines and around the world.
Social media also documents the support of former senior officials of the Ramos, Arroyo and Aquino administrations. Ex-senators and congressmen as well as provincial governors and city mayors also indicated their support. Groups of economists, national artists, lawyers, doctors, nurses, and the laity, have also initiated this snowballing movement of volunteers who pay their way to stand behind Leni’s cause for honest governance.
Many Pinoy celebrities and influencers have also thrown their support for her. The list continues to grow by the day.
The momentum appears unstoppable.
Another data point is the size of the crowd attending the proclamation rallies and caravans. Marcos Jr.’s organizers claimed that in Pangasinan, some two million out of 3.2 million population attended his various activities. But this implies that some two-thirds of all of Pangasinan left their homes for the two days of his campaign. His Tarlac rally was called off allegedly due to poor attendance. His Antique sortie was also cancelled because the residents protested.
In the case of the pink crowd of Leni, we now see some kind of an Olympinks. Local organizers are engaged in friendly competition in size and sight. It was claimed that Cavite so far topped in size with 47,000. Bulacan was second with 45,000 while Iloilo was third with 40,000. But Bulacan was top in fireworks display, the spectacular performance of Kuh Ledesma who sang “Ang Bayan Ko” and the Doctors for Leni’s most moving Filipino rendition of Les Miserables’ “Do You Hear the People Sing?”
Third data point would be the ability of the candidates and their teams to inspire and sustain momentum until the May 2022 election. For some reasons, Marcos Jr. excused himself from a number of important national presidential debates and fora. He preferred to appear in casual interviews by talk show hosts rather than those handled by broadcast journalists. All the other presidential aspirants showed up. Marcos Jr.’s 2016 experience in the CNN debate must have been so traumatic for him. We can’t wait to see the impact of his non-appearances on future survey results.
Those associated with Marcos Jr. have allegedly started to engage in unfair campaign tactics. Pink tarpaulins and other campaign materials have been torn down from private homes and buildings. Civil society participants also complained of local officials who blocked streets and bridges leading to pink proclamation rallies. This campaign has also seen some parties red-tagging some of the participants in those pink caravans and proclamation rallies.
Fair and square no more.
Do we hear what the people are saying?