spot_img
27.6 C
Philippines
Friday, March 29, 2024

Groups whose presidential support will be crucial

- Advertisement -

The support of large groups of voters will be crucial to the success of one of the five candidates for president in the 2016 election. The most important of these are the youth— voters aged from 18 to 30 years—the women, the farmers, the regional groups and the largest political parties.

Who among the five candidates—Mar Roxas, Grace Poe, Jejomar Binay, Rodrigo Duterte and Miriam Defensor-Santiago – is likely to get the support of the majorities of these groups?

Support of young Filipino voters—accounting for anywhere up to 50 percent of the 56 million registered voters will be not only the biggest plum for the candidates, but it is also the most unpredictable among the major elements of this year’s election. What are the so-called millennials—mainly those born after the Edsa Revolution—thinking? To whom do they best relate: the experienced but colorless Roxas, the inexperienced but eager Poe, the accomplished but ailing Santiago, the competent but legally vulnerable Binay, the experienced and tough Duterte? Young voters probably relate to Poe because of her comparative youthfulness and to Santiago and Duterte for their toughness in a time of all-things-to-all-men public administration. There’s no doubt about it: whoever is able to capture the youth will have a long headstart in the May 9 polls.

Will this country’s women automatically go for either Grace Poe or Miriam Santiago? Not necessarily. The first of the two women who became president of the Philippines won because her opponent was Ferdinand Marcos, and the second female Chief Executive, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, was never elected by the Filipino people (the 2004 election having been won, in the eyes of most observers, by the late Fernando Poe Jr.). In the latest opinion surveys, only around 31 percent of respondents have selected Grace Poe, with Miriam Santiago as the consistent tail-ender. But, who knows? With the Poe disqualification issue settled by the Supreme Court, a majority of Filipino women voters could, for the first time, elect this country’s second female president.

Because of the absence of what can be referred to as honest-to-goodness agricultural policy, it is not possible to speak of a farm vote in this country, in the same way that communicators on US elections speak of a Farm Belt vote. Voters in sugar-growing areas tend to vote for candidates endorsed by their representatives; the same goes for Filipino farmers who grow rice, corn, coconuts, tobacco, etc. But a presidential candidate who espouses a sub-sector is likely to be at the receiving end of an adverse reaction. Grace Poe’s recent statements on the coconut levy cannot have been well received by this country’s coconut farmers.

- Advertisement -

Historically, Filipino voters have exhibited a tendency to vote for presidents and other national officers on a favorite-son basis, preferring those who hail from the same region and speak the regional language over those who don’t. Following history, on May 9, a majority of the voters who speak Cebuano or come from the Davao City area should go for Rodrigo Duterte. That’s a large voter base. The Western Visayas vote would probably be split between Miriam Santiago, who belongs to the Defensor family of Iloilo and Mar Roxas, whose parentage consists of families from Panay Island. Grace Poe can claim to be a Western Visayan, having been found in an Iloilo church. Jejomar Binay’s ties to Batangas are neither deep nor well-publicized. A strong regional language base would definitely be a big plus.

Finally, there are the machineries of the four major political parties (Liberal Party, Nationalist People’s Coalition, PDP-Laban and Lakas-UMDC). To give their standard bearers a very strong push, the two largest parties, the Liberal Party (Roxas’s) and NPC (Poe’s) need to be united. But this is just the point: the parties are not united and are experiencing defections and loyalty-related doubts. This is certainly the case with the Liberal Party, which definitely cannot count on the firm loyalty of its 110-plus House of Representatives members. And the recent announcement by the NPC leadership of the party’s support for Grace Poe was received with skepticism, even incredulity, in many quarters.

Summing up, the above five groups, being the largest agglomeration, will decide the outcome of the 2016 presidential election. It sounds simplistic to say that if Mar Roxas generated enthusiasm among young and female voters and could relate to the Cebuano-speaking people of this country, he would be on his way to Malacanang. 

But this cannot be said of the daang matuwid’s standard bearer. Like his four opponents, Mar will just have to pick up as many majorities as he can among the nation’s age, gender, sector, regional and political-party groups, and hope that the total votes will be the ticket to Malacañang.

E-mail: rudyromero777@yahoo.com

- Advertisement -

LATEST NEWS

Popular Articles