Who Will be the Best President of the Philippines in 2022?
Statistically Speaking v. 2.0 (SS2OS-2020–03)
by Dr. Romulo A. Virola [E1]
You may recall that in our 14 June 2020 post, your responses to the first question of our 3rd Statistically Speaking v.2.0 Online Survey (SS2OS-2020–03): “Since 1965, who do you think has been our greatest President?” showed a close contest between Pres. Duterte and Pres. Marcos. Further, for the second question, the results of which were published on 19 June 2020, you thought that the main deciding factor for most Filipino voters when they vote for President in 2022 would be Performance/Qualifications/Leadership qualities followed by Platform of governance, Personality/ Physical characteristics, and Amount of Money paid for the vote. Seem like a good sign for the 2022 elections?
What about your responses to the 3rd question: “Who do you think will be the best President for the Philippines in 2022?”
Subject to the limitations [E2] of our online survey, and based on your weighted and unweighted choices [E3] from a randomized sequence of 16 “presidentiables”, below is a summary of your views. For the additional Background information and the Respondents’ Profile, please refer to our June 14, 2020 and 19 June 2020 posts. For the interactive dashboard, please go to this link.
Unweighted/Weighted Considering Top 1 Votes Only
There are 4 seemingly delineated groups of “presidentiables”:
- Group 1: Leni Robredo,
— the clear choice of many as the best president in 2022.
- Group 2: Isko Moreno & Sara Duterte,
— the only ones among the 15 other names on the list who gave Robredo some semblance of a fight, vying for second/third.
- Group 3: Bongbong Marcos, Mar Roxas, Panfilo Lacson, Grace Poe & Manny Pacquiao,
— who may be considered unpopular/inconsequential choices at the moment and who had better do something between now and May 2022 or bid goodbye to their presidential ambitions, if any.
- Group 4: Lourdes Sereno, Bong Go, Antonio Trillanes, Leila de Lima, Tito Sotto, Loren Legarda, Risa Hontiveros, & Cynthia Villar,
— who will probably need a miracle to become a resident of Malacanan in 2022; otherwise, perish the thought?
Some observations [E4]:
- Unlike your views on the best President since 1965 which was closely contested by Pres. Duterte and Pres. Marcos, for the best President of the Philippines after the 2022 elections, Robredo is clearly ahead of the field. Moreno and Duterte are in a close fight for second.
- On the other hand, Cynthia Villar received practically 0 vote and came out last in all 4 rankings! Is this a consequence of her “Baliw na baliw kayo sa research” mindset [E5]?
- The “unpopular/inconsequential choices” (Group 3) include two former presidential candidates and one former vice-presidential candidate while those needing a “miracle” (Group 4) include 3 topnotchers in past senatorial elections. Further notice [E6] of “changing of the guards” in Philippine politics?
- Weighting (by share of voters) does not change the results too much, particularly the rankings. Likewise, whether we consider only the Top 1 votes or Top 1–3 votes [E7], the rankings remain pretty much the same.
- Robredo got the most top 1 Votes from the following subgroups
— Regardless of
~ Gender
~ Age
~ Religious affiliation
— All income groups except those with monthly income below PhP 20,000 from whom she got only the 3rd highest no of Top 1 votes behind Moreno and Duterte.
— Those with college and post graduate degrees [E8] but not among college undergraduates where she came in a close second to Moreno
— Regardless of residence except in Mindanao where she only received the 4th highest top 1 Votes behind Duterte, Moreno, and Marcos
- Moreno was
— Top 1 among those with
~ no college degrees
~ with monthly income below PhP20,000
— Second to Robredo among female respondents
- Duterte was
— Top 1 in Mindanao where she received more than the total Top 1 votes of all other 15 “presidentiables” combined
~ Second to Robredo among
~ the male respondents
~ those at least 40 but below 60 years old
~ those who have masteral/doctoral degree
- In other words, out of the 20 subgroups of respondents [E4], Robredo was not the Top 1 choice by only 3 subgroups. The columnist who likened Robredo to Catherine the Great must be elated! [E9]
- But we have to be wary of the many Don’t Know (DK) responses ( 13–14%). In close elections, such DK or undecided votes can sway the results either way! They can give Isko Moreno and Sara Duterte some hope, but if your views represent those of majority of the voters come 2022, more than hope will be needed!
So there!!!! Despite the fact that Pres. Marcos and Pres. Duterte figured very highly in the race for best president since 1965 in this survey, in the race for our best president in 2022, Bongbong is only a far fourth, and Sara a not so near second/third! Did you notice the “inconsistency” between how you responded to the first question versus how you did to the third question? Or is it totally wrong to think that just because you considered Pres. Marcos and Pres. Duterte as the frontliners for our best president since 1965, you would favor their children just as popularly as our best president in 2022? In that case, could the “troll effect/ rigging” that some of you may have suspected/feared, be nothing but a fertile figment of the imagination? ? I am sure there are more productive activities one can engage in!
Talking about productive-minded people, have you read about Mathematics teacher Efren Cabotage of the Narvacan National Central High School in Ilocos Sur, who spent his own money to load-up his pocket Wi-Fi then climbed a mountain to get a strong Wi-Fi signal? Efren did this to help students who are not equipped with gadgets and internet as he does, to enroll for the post-COVID schoolyear! [E9] Efren, you are my kind of Filipino! May your tribe increase and God bless you!
Endnotes:
[E1]: Romulo A. Virola is formerly with the Actuarial Research and Development Group of the GSIS, and a former Professorial Lecturer in the Graduate Programs of the Statistical Center/School of Statistics and the Department of Mathematics (now the Institute of Mathematics) of the University of the Philippines . He retired in 2012 as Secretary General of the then National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) of the Philippines or NSCB (now part of the Philippine Statistics Authority). He finished his BS (Mathematics) from UP, and MS (Actuarial Mathematics) and PhD (Statistics) from the University of Michigan, where he was a Fellow in its Sampling Program for Foreign Statisticians under the late Prof. Leslie Kish, author of the pioneering “Survey Sampling”, considered by many as the bible in the field. He used to write/co-write the Statistically Speaking articles posted on the NSCB website from 2004 until his retirement. The author thanks his former colleagues in the National Statistical System (NSS) of the Philippines particularly from the NSCB, Jay Mendoza of IOM, UN Migration Agency and some FB adviser-friends for the assistance and support in preparing this paper.
[E2]: The survey does not use a randomly drawn probability sample of respondents. Thus, the results should not be interpreted as coming from a nationally-representative sample, much less a representative sample from any of the “subdomains”. Comparisons across subgroups are valid only for the sample.
As a private sector initiative, it did not pass thru the PSA Statistical Survey Review and Clearance System (SSRCS), one of many mechanisms started by the NSCB for statistical coordination. Under the SSRCS, surveys conducted by or for the government pass review to ensure adherence to internationally recognized statistical standards and methodologies and to avoid duplication of efforts by the different agencies comprising the national statistical system.
We also do not ask for the name, address/email address, or tel. number of the respondent which could be useful in validating responses.
[E3]: Statistically Speaking v. 2.0 thanks all the respondents who participated in the survey and all the Statistically Speaking v. 2.0 FB friends and followers who encouraged their own FB friends to participate. Statistically Speaking v. 2.0 is also grateful to Google for the use of its online survey facility, as well as Medium.com and Public.Tableau. com
[E4]: Considering only subgroups with at least 30 respondents
[E5]: https://www.onenews.ph/
[E6]: See our 19 June 2020 FB post on the second question of the survey
[E7]: Considering the Top 1–3 votes, we arbitrarily assigned 10 points for each Top 1 vote, 5 points for each Top 2 vote, and 2 points for each Top 3 vote and converted the totals to relative scores (%) by dividing the totals by the maximum possible score
[E8]: Five respondents did not specify their educational attainment
