Is Binay out of the equation?
Going over the columns that I have written about the coming presidential elections, we seem to have a good track record in our prognosis and analysis. We believed that Grace Poe should run and will run; we advocated and predicted that the trend line and the slope of the trends would favor Mar Roxas; we believed that PNoy's endorsement would matter; that the INC issue would affect certain candidates badly; and that it seems that it will be a Roxas-Poe battle royale.
We even urged that De Lima should run for senator, as the INC issue had given her a lot of media mileage and publicity that was worth millions. We did not do any crystal ball gazing when we wrote these articles, we were just being keenly observant and used simple forecasting tools and political skills developed over many years.
The latest polls by the Social Weather Station and Pulse Asia have put the three presidential candidates - Poe, Roxas, and Binay - at a statistical tie with Duterte just slightly behind. The significant movements are: Roxas very steep rise, from 10% to 20%, and the continuing slide of Binay's rating. The movements of Poe and Duterte's rating were smaller at 1% to 2%. All these validates our contention of the importance of the "slope," the rise over the run, which considering the remaining six and a half months to the election, will be the crucial factor in determining who will be the winner. In the case of Binay, aside from the continuing decline in his ratings, what is not obvious in the polls but is implied, is his not being the second choice in the voters preference. The SWS or Pulse Asia surveys did not publish or maybe did not ask the respondents who would be their second choice, but the ranking implies that Roxas and Poe and Duterte are second choices of their positive respondents. The emergence of the "Anybody but Binay Movement" supports this conclusion, and anecdotal opinions though informal, also points in this direction.
Dissecting the solid constituency of each of the candidates; the Binay core group is mainly in the economic classes D and E particularly in the provinces. These are vulnerable to the Poe popularity and the star image of Poe and the grassroots political machinery of Roxas. In Mindanao and Central Visayas areas, Duterte will also be able to poach on this core group of Binay. Of all the presidential candidates, Binay's core constituency is the most vulnerable. And when he does not have the logistical resources to hold on to these core supporters, they will eventually move away to the other candidates. This could lead to a "catch 22" situation where your downhill slide prevents you from getting the contributions and resources that you need to get out of the situation, and you need exactly these resources and contributions to stop the downhill slide and go uphill. In this kind of scenario, one will need a major event or a minor miracle to reverse the situation.
The core constituency of Roxas is in the business sector, the A, B, and C social class plus the Liberal Party machinery, which properly managed is 25% of the voters. The core constituency of Grace Poe cuts all the social classes, A,B,C,D, and E and in the smaller political parties that will carry her. This is also her 25% of the voters. Binay and Duterte will hold on to their respective 15%, so it is the remaining 20% that will determine the winner for the presidency in May 2016. It will still be a Roxas-Poe contest even if Duterte will eventually decide to join the fray. If Pnoy's satisfaction rating holds up to May 2016, and he really campaigns and oils the LP political machinery, Roxas will have an edge over Poe. If Poe manages to raise enough logistics and covers enough of the country together with the star celebrities, then Poe will have the edge.
In a simple equation, like A+B+C+D = S, transposition will get us the values of A or B or C or D. In some computation however, when certain values are not expected to change, and we consider them as "constants," we compute only for the relevant values. In the case of Binay and Duterte, at this point of time, it seems that their values are constant so while they are still part of the equation, they are not that important anymore. Binay and Duterte may still be in the equation but their relevance will be diminishing as election day gets nearer.
However, since nobody can predict events from happening and their consequences, anyone including those who will file their certificates of candidacies at the last minute, can still be president. I believe in destiny but I also believe in karma, that eventually we reap and deserve what we sowed and planted.
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