MANILA, Philippines—A majority of Filipino voters believe that opposition Sen. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III should replace President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in 2010, results of a nationwide survey conducted by Social Weather Stations from Sept. 18 to 21 showed.
Sixty percent of 1,800 respondents mentioned Aquino after being asked: “Who do you think are good leaders who should succeed President Arroyo as President?” Respondents were allowed to give up to three names.
Sen. Manuel “Manny” Villar, who was in the lead in opinion polls before Aquino announced his candidacy, was second with 37 percent, up from 33 percent in June.
Former President Joseph “Erap” Estrada came in third at 18 percent (down from 25 percent), followed by Sen. Francis “Chiz” Escudero at 15 percent (down from 20 percent), and Sen. Manuel “Mar” Roxas II at 12 percent (down from 20 percent).
The survey had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 2.3 percentage points.
In 10 previous surveys, which asked the same question, Aquino, only son of the late President Cory Aquino and assassinated Sen. Benigno Aquino Jr., was not mentioned by respondents.
Aquino announced his plan to run for president on Sept. 9 amid the warm public sentiment for his mother who died on Aug. 1.
He topped a survey by the SWS in the vote-rich regions of Luzon early last month, winning the nod of an overwhelming 50 percent of respondents.
The survey, commissioned by private individuals and businessmen, was conducted on Sept. 5 and 6 among 1,200 respondents.
Huge declines for Noli, Loren
Vice President Noli de Castro and Sen. Loren Legarda both lost more than half of their supporters in the latest SWS survey, with the former getting 8 percent (down from 19 percent), and the latter receiving only 5 percent (down from 15 percent).
Support for Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro Jr. went up to 4 percent from 0.8 percent, while that for Sen. Panfilo Lacson fell from 7 percent to 2 percent.
Support for Makati Mayor Jejomar Binay also went down from 4 percent to 2 percent.
Bayani Fernando, Metropolitan Manila Development Authority chair, maintained his one percent, while those rooting for Bro. Eddie Villanueva rose from 0.8 to 1 percent.
Six percent of last month’s respondents could not give an answer, while 4 percent had no one to recommend.
Grateful
Aquino felt grateful that he topped the latest SWS survey.
“It humbles me to get such amount of support,” Aquino said, telling reporters that the survey showed that he was correct in “waging the people’s campaign.”
“But at the end of the day, I think … this is the expression of the people’s desire for substantive change in our country,” he said.
Aquino said the results should spur the Liberal Party to strive more to translate that support “into actuality.”
“Our platform, our solution is commensurate to the problems our countrymen are facing,” he said, adding that it was “imperative” that he and Roxas (his running mate) should work to change the government and society as a whole.
Villar confident
Adel Tamano, spokesperson of Villar’s Nacionalista Party (NP), said that despite the changes in the rankings in the survey, the party remained confident of its chances in the May 2010 national elections.
“This is part of the dynamics of a political campaign, and we expect more changes to happen in the run-up to the May 2010 elections, Tamano said in a statement.
He noted that when Villar expressed his intention to run for president, the NP standard-bearer ranked sixth in the surveys.
Tamano said Villar was able to improve his ratings through “sipag at tiyaga” (industry and patience).
The NP spokesperson said Villar would continue to work hard so that he could help put our country back on its feet.
Encouraging trajectory
Teodoro, the standard-bearer of the administration’s Lakas-Kampi-CMD coalition, was heartened by the rise in his rating.
“That’s very encouraging trajectory and elections are still many months away. The more people get to know who Gibo (Teodoro) really is and what he can do, we are confident this will continue to rise faster,” Teodoro’s spokesperson Nelson Victorino said in a text message to the Inquirer.
The deadline for filing candidacies is Nov. 30.
Estrada running again
Estrada, ousted in a popular uprising in 2001 and later convicted of graft, Wednesday said he would run again for president in next year’s elections.
“Yes, I will run,” Estrada, 72, told Agence France Presse, when asked to confirm press reports of his decision.
The formal announcement will be made at Sto. Niño church in Tondo, Manila, on Wednesday next week, Estrada said.
“I will not run for the presidency if I’m not sure I’ll win,” he said. Reports from Cyril L. Bonabente, Inquirer Research; Michael Lim Ubac, Christian V. Esguerra, Reuters and Agence France-Presse
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