Filipinos split on whether Maharlika fund can deliver benefits — SWS
MANILA, Philippines — Filipinos are divided about whether the proposed Maharlika Investment Fund—which is now up for President Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr’s signature—will bring benefits to the country, a survey by Social Weather Stations suggested.
Opinion on benefits: Fifty-one percent of Filipino adults expected “little to no benefit” from the creation of the country’s first sovereign wealth fund, according to a survey conducted in March and published only on Thursday.
Broken down, 37% said they expected “little benefit” from the MIF, while 14% expected “almost no benefit at all.”
Meanwhile, 46% of the 1,200 survey respondents said the sovereign fund may deliver benefits. Of those, 14% expected “very much benefit” and 32% expected “much benefit.”
- 51% expect "little to no benefit"
- 46% expect "much benefit"
Marcos had strongly pushed for the MIF, which seeks to establish a sovereign wealth fund by tapping funding from government financial institutions.
Business groups, academia, economists, opposition lawmakers, and civil society, however, flagged several provisions as problematic such as the use of state pension funds as seed money.
Opinion on corruption likelihood: The SWS survey also found that the opinions on whether the MIF will be prone to corruption were mixed.
Thirty-one percent of Filipino adults said they have “much confidence”—10% “very much confidence” and 22% “much confidence”—that the proposal will not end up in corruption.
Thirty-eight percent were undecided, while 29% expressed “little confidence”—10% “very much confidence” and 11% “very much confidence.”
- 38% are undecided.
- 31% have "much confidence" it will not end up in corruption.
- 29% have "little confidence" it will not end up in corruption.
According to SWS, the net expected benefit from Maharlika was slightly higher in Balance Luzon at +2 and Metro Manila at +1 than in Visayas at -10 and Mindanao at -18.
Meanwhile, the net confidence that the MIF will be free from corruption was slightly higher in Visayas at +6 and Balance Luzon at +4 than in Mindanao at -2 and the capital region at -3.
Knowledge about Maharlika: The private polling firm also found that only 20% of Filipino adults said they have at least partial but sufficient knowledge about MIF. Of those, only 5% have “extensive knowledge” and 15% have “partial but sufficient knowledge.”
On the other hand, 33% of Filipinos said they have “only a little knowledge” about the sovereign wealth fund, while nearly half, or 47% said they have “almost no knowledge or no knowledge at all.”
- 47% believe they have "almost no knowledge or no knowledge at all"
- 33% believe they have "only a little knowledge"
- 20% believe they have at least partial but sufficient knowledge
Knowledge about MIF was higher in Metro Manila (29%) and Balance Luzon (24%) than in Visayas (14%) and Mindanao (10%).
SWS noted that the net confidence that MIF will not be prone to corruption was higher among those with knowledge about the measure and among those who expect to benefit a lot from it.
The measure creating the controversial MIF—a pet bill of the administration—was transmitted to Malacañang this week over a month after Congress swiftly passed it. Marcos earlier said that he will immediately sign the bill once he gets it.
The SWS survey was conducted from March 26 to 29—two months before the Senate passed the bill creating MIF after a marathon session and the House later agreed to adopt the upper chamber’s version.
It had sampling error margins of ±2.8% for national percentages, and ±5.7% each for Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. — Gaea Katreena Cabico with reports from Cristina Chi and Ramon Royandoyan
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