Drilon tops senatorial mobile poll

MANILA, Philippines - Senate President Franklin Drilon emerged as the leading senatorial candidate in the latest Bilang Pilipino Social Weather Stations (SWS) Mobile Survey commissioned by TV5.

Drilon, a Liberal Party (LP) stalwart, got the nod of 63 percent of validated voters surveyed, according to the poll conducted on April 1.

Former senator Francis Pangilinan (LP) came in a close second with 61 percent, followed by consistent survey front-runner Sen. Vicente Sotto III (Nationalist People’s Coalition) with 56 percent.

Occupying the fourth and fifth places are former Akbayan representative Risa Hontiveros and Sen. Ralph Recto with 54 percent each. Both are running under the LP coalition.

Former senator Panfilo Lacson (independent) landed in sixth place with 52 percent, followed by former senator Richard Gordon (independent) with 51 percent.

Former justice secretary Leila de Lima (LP), former senator Juan Miguel Zubiri (independent) and Valenzuela City Rep. Sherwin Gatchalian (NPC) got 50 percent each. They were ranked from eighth to 10th.

The last two seats are being contended by Sen. Sergio Osmeña III (independent) with 47 percent; former Technical Education and Skills Development Authority director general Joel Villanueva (LP), 41 percent; world boxing icon and Sarangani Rep. Manny Pacquiao (United Nationalist Alliance), 39 percent; Manila Vice Mayor Isko Moreno Domagoso (Partido ng Masang Pilipino) and Sen. Teofisto Guingona III (LP), each with 38 percent, and actor Edu Manzano (independent) with 36 percent.

The Bilang Pilipino SWS Mobile Survey has 1,200 panel respondents who are registered voters. However, only 727, or 61 percent, responded in the poll, consisting of 194 respondents in Metro Manila, 178 in balance Luzon, 193 in the Visayas and 162 in Mindanao.

It has sampling error margins of plus or minus four percentage points for national percentages.