PRESIDENT Rodrigo Duterte isn’t losing his popularity among the poor, Malacañang said Thursday amid the apparent decline of his survey numbers mainly attributed to the bloody war on drugs mainly targeted on the poor.
“[We’re] not alarmed,” Presidential Spokesperson Ernesto Abella said.
“I would say there’s a dip, instead of an erosion,” Abella said in a news briefing in Malacañang.
An opposition lawmaker, Rep. Gary Alejano, who filed the first impeachment complaint against Duterte, said the Palace should not be complacent as there was already “waning support” for the administration’s campaign against illegal drugs.
He added people were “getting fed up and worried” over the fear they could fall victims of [extra judicial killings] under the administration’s war on drugs.
Senator Panfilo Lacson, meanwhile, said the tactics being employed by the Duterte administration in its war on illegal drugs were starting to reach their saturation point as far as the public was concerned.
The latest Pulse Asia March 2017 survey showed a decline on the trust ratings of the President to 76 percent, down 7 points from 83 percent in December.
Duterte’s approval rating, on the other hand, was at 78 percent in March, down 5 points from 83 percent in December, the pollster said.
Duterte’s trust scores fell by 7 points and 11 points among members of Class D and E, respectively. This was offset by a 12-point increase in trust among members of Classes A, B and C.
Approval of the President’s performance among Class D and E also declined by 6 and 8 points, respectively.
More than 6,000 have been killed in the campaign, deaths that critics have branded as extrajudicial slays.
