Binay to rivals ahead in surveys: Don’t celebrate yet

MANILA, Philippines - “Do not celebrate yet.”

This was the message of Rico Quicho, Vice President Jejomar Binay’s campaign spokesman, to other presidential aspirants leading in the latest surveys.

“It will be a tight race all the way to election day. The surveys do not capture the intense ground campaigning by the Vice President’s core supporters and parallel groups nationwide,” Quicho said.

In a survey conducted by Pulse Asia from April 26 to 29 and commissioned by ABS-CBN, one in three Filipinos or 33 percent picked Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte to be the country’s next president.

Liberal Party standard-bearer Mar Roxas and Sen. Grace Poe of the Gobyernong May Puso were statistically tied for the second spot with 22 percent and 21 percent, respectively.

Binay, standard-bearer of the United Nationalist Alliance (UNA), remained at fourth with 17 percent voter preference, down by one point from his previous rating.

Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago still trails with two percent.

Quicho is confident the opposition bet will come out the winner in the May 9 polls.

Binay vowed to end the “insensitive and inept governance” if he is elected president.

“No more incompetent official will remain in office just because he’s a friend, a classmate or a shooting buddy,” the vice president said, taking a swipe at President Aquino, a known gun enthusiast.

UNA:Duterte is Phl Kim Jong-un

UNA likened Duterte to North Korea’s supreme leader and dictator Kim Jong-un.

UNA secretary general JV Bautista and Quicho expressed fear on a “Kim-(Di)gong” on the way to Malacañang.

“Anyone publicly displaying his contempt for the law and his despotic tendencies, just like Rodrigo Duterte, is not the man to be made president of the Philippines,” Bautista said.

“It’s time to lift the veil that surrounds Duterte. He is a serious threat to our democracy. He does not value life and he is supporting extra-judicial killings,” Bautista added.

He said Duterte’s warning of a “bloody” presidency and promise to have 10,000 criminals killed and their bodies thrown in the sea are reminiscent of history’s ruthless dictators like Idi Amin of Uganda or North Korea’s Kim.

He said a possible war could erupt between the Philippines and its allies over Duterte’s threat to sever diplomatic ties after the US and Australia slammed him over his rape comment about Australian missionary Jacqueline Hamill in 1989.

Bautista said Duterte has no respect for international relations and the Philippines could “become a pariah nation and that is very dangerous.”

Duterte had said that he is the Davao Death Squad (DDS), a vigilante group that carried out many of the killings. In some of his television interviews, he claimed to have killed 1,700 criminals.

“He is out to make a sham of the democracy we hold dear,” Bautista said.

Surveys questioned

Meanwhile, a political analyst and professor of the University of the Philippines has questioned the two surveys of Pulse Asia, which were conducted only two days apart and showed different results.

UP professor Prospero de Vera said surveys could be manipulated to project the rise of a candidate.

The April 26 to 29 showed Roxas gaining two points and overtaking Poe for second place.

In the vice presidential race, Roxas’ runningmate Leni Robredo gained four points and overtook frontrunner Sen. Bongbong Marcos.

Leni obtained 30 points, while Marcos dropped three points to 28 percent.

The other survey was conducted just two days earlier or from April 19 to 24.

De Vera said he could not help but suspect the results.

“There is something abnormal. It’s suspicious so the camp of Senator Marcos is warning about possible manipulation of the survey result,” he said in Filipino.

He said when a candidate is hounded by issues, it takes about a month for the surveys to reflect the results in public opinion.  – With Perseus Echeminada