VICE PRESIDENT JOJO BINAY and Senator Chiz Escudero topped the survey for president and vice president respectively in a poll survey conducted by the Social Weather Station in early January.
For President                 For Vice President
Binay     31%                                   Escudero    28%
Poe        24%                                   Marcos        25%
Roxas    21%                  Robredo      17%
Duterte  20%                 Cayetano     14%
Santiago  4%                                   Honasan       8%
Trillanes 3%
As corruption charges were less ventilated, VP Binay improved 6 points from 26% to 31%, ahead of the pact followed by senator Grace Poe at 24% from a 26% tie with Binay previously. LP candidate senator Mar Roxas slipped to 21% from 22% but ahead of Davao city mayor Rody Duterte who had an initial surge when he announced his candidacy.
Senator Miriam Santiago who is nursing an ailment has never gone into double digits and languishes at the bottom pile.
President Aquino who has not hidden his disdain for VP Binay said that “soon” he will be facing charges in court and cases ventilated again into public view.
Unconfirmed reports also indicated some candidates have gotten an inside track of SWA -as to where the locations of the 1,200 respondents would be-and thus focus their presence in those areas before the actual survey -giving them a head start in recall.
Senator Grace Poe, on the other hand, is hopeful that her campaign will be revitalized as her court cases are slowly being resolved in her favor.
Her running mate senator Chiz Escudero, on the other hand, has been perched on top of the VP derby in the last surveys and remained at the lead with 28%, though down from 31%. Moving fast is senator Bongbong Marcos at 25% up 6 points from 19%.
President Aquino also mentioned that senator Marcos will also be answering charges against the Marcos family for ill gotten wealth and human rights violations. LP Leni Robredo is third at 17% down from 19% followed by senator Allan Cayetano at 14% down from 17%.
At the cellar are senators Gringo Honasan and Antonio Trillanes IV at 8% and 5% respectively.
On the other hand , if senatorial elections were held in early January, the administration would have controlled the race 9-3 with only former senators Migz Zubiri, Dick Gordon and newcomer Rep Manny Pacquiao from the opposition making the grade.
The SWS early January survey results for senator:
1. Sotto-       56%                      7. Zubiri       39%
2. Lacson     49%                      8. Pacquiao   37%
3. Recto         46%                     9. De Lima     33%
4. Pangilinan 46%                   10. Gordon     31%
5. Drilon         43%                   11-13 For. Rep Risa Hontiveros
6. Osmena    42%                             senator TG Guingona
Vice Mayor Isko Moreno-Â 25%
The first 6 places go to reelectionist senators and only senator TG Guingona languishes tied at 11-13th places. Zubiri and Gordon are former senators and Risa Hontiveros is a former party list congresswoman. The newcomers are Rep Manny Pacquiao, former justice secretary Leila de Lima and vice mayor Isko Moreno of Manila.
It is too early to conclude that definite trends have been established especially in the presidential race. In the senate race, the first six reelectionists seem to have a lock on the winning track as they have been consistently there since many months back.
Watch out as the tide turns high and low and find out the reasons why.
For comments: email to dejarescobingo@yahoo.com or bohol-rd@mozcom.com