Google has a different approach. As we are all aware, the internet has become our primary source of information. In the Philippines, 92.1 million are netizens and members of at least one social media platform. There are 4.2 billion daily Google searches worldwide and this is mined for valuable data to foretell voters’ preferences. Google accounts for 80 percent of worldwide searches. Its dominance has enabled it to become a representative sample of populations. By counting searches through keywords, Google is able to establish trends. In general, the candidate whose name is searched more and whose positive engagements outnumber negative comments emerges as the trend leader. The trend leader eventually wins the elections. This has been true in the United States, Canada and numerous democracies.
Doctor of Social Psychology of the University of California Christine Ma-Kellams said that Google search has become the most powerful predictor of political behavior compared to other measures. This is because data generated on digital channels are free from posturing and reflect the people’s true intentions, without filters. Hence, it is a more reliable predictor of election outcomes.
Google Trends has been accurate even in high-volatility scenarios where trolls disrupt the general online sentiment. Not only was it successful in predicting the election outcomes in the United States since 2004 (including Trump’s 2016 win), it has accurately predicted the victories of Canadian Prime Minsters Paul Martin in 2003, Stephen Harper in 2006, 2008 and 2011 and Justin Trudeau in 2015, 2019 and 2021. Similarly, Google Trends accurately predicted the election results in Greece, Spain, Germany, Brazil and the Philippines, where Mr. Duterte won.
That said, we can assume that the candidate who will become the new Philippine president is the one who generates the most Google searches and who arouses the greatest positive sentiment among the voting public today.
So who leads in Google Trends among the two leading candidate.s?
The Google Trend report covering Feb. 5 to March 2, 2022 (which you can refer to on Google itself) shows that the keywords “Leni” and “Robredo” lead in search and positive engagements with an aggregate score of 107. The keywords “BBM,” “Bongbong ” and “Marcos” trails with a score of 79.
These are the breakdown of scores of the two leading candidates in the various regions of the country: Metro Manila – Robredo 59, Marcos 41; Calabarzon – Robredo 61, Marcos 39; Central Luzon – Robredo 57, Marcos 43; Central Visayas – Robredo 56, Marcos 44; Ilocos Region – Robredo 48, Marcos 52; CAR – Robredo 60, Marcos 40; CARAGA – Robredo 68, Marcos 32; Cagayan Valley – Robredo 54, Marcos 46; Bicol Region – Robredo 69, Marcos 32; Western Visayas – Robredo 61, Marcos 39; Eastern Visayas – Robredo 55, Marcos 45; Central Visayas – Robredo 56, Marcos 44; Northern Mindanao – Robredo 58, Marcos 42; Davao Region – Robredo 53, Marcos 47; Zamboanga Peninsula – Robredo 59, Marcos 41; SOCCSKARGEN – Robredo 59, Marcos 41; MIMAROPA – Robredo 58, Marcos 42; ARMM – Robredo 70, Marcos 30.
Taking the data of the last five weeks into consideration, Google Trends predicts a Robredo victory.
So says Andrew Masigan, the Corner Oracle. In the past few days, the opposition, aided by mainstream media, has been flooding the news cycle with articles and interviews about Google Trends, Facebook Analytics and UP Professors discrediting surveys, except for SWS, of course. Think of Mahar Mangahas as their in-house pollster. Even Masigan singles them out.
Since I am not a data science geek, these are all Greek to me. I have enough memory of basic statistics but I do know that a survey with specific methodology is more scientific than one which is based on vox populi random interviews.
What I did was to go to Google Trends and see what I could dig up. Robredo is definitely ahead of Marcos but is there enough basis to lay claim to victory in May 9 on the basis of Google Trends? I do not think so. For this election day, you are talking about roughly 64M registered voters. This is where survey design comes in as a science in order to lay the basis for the survey results.
The above are the results of the data from Google Trends from January 1 to March 1, 2022 for the five Presidential candidates. So does this mean that Robredo will win on May 9? On the simple basis that she is leading in terms of Google Search?
It cannot be discounted that the opposition will do whatever it take to prevent a Marcos victory. This is a given. There are unsubstantiated claims about a group preparing for poll fraud. Again, normal given the existence of the Comelec Mafia.
What is really questionable is the MOA signed between Rappler and the Comelec. This is supposedly at the instigation of James Jimenez. But this has been nipped in the bud as Acting Chair Socorro Inting scrapped the agreement. To begin with, Rappler is biased. It also has a credibility problem because it is the least trusted media outlet in the country. Why Jimenez would push for the MOA only he and Maria Ressa know. The other day, the President also filled up the vacancies in the Comelec. The seven Commissioners comprising the poll body now are all Duterte appointees.
The President has stated that he will ensure clean and peaceful elections. As we are coming into the homestretch of the campaign, Duterte is likely to drop hints of who his favored candidates are. He has been cherry-picking in the Senate race. Some of his choices sit well with the public. The others do not. It remains to be seen if this will be the trend given Duterte has made a general statement about electing new faces instead of the balik-Senadors.
The opposition is clearly engaged in bandwagoning in an effort to convince voters to go over to their side. Filipinos have this twisted mindset about not letting their votes go to waste by voting for who is going to win instead of their real choice if the latter is bound to lose. There are also those who opt for split tickets. This is the strategy of the Isko campaign with IsSa or Isko-Sara.
The opposition has to contend with two humongous challenges; the popularity of Marcos and the influence of the President over the electorate. They will not admit it nor can they counter it but their black propaganda alone cannot change the voter’s mindset other than those who actually have cognitive bias for them. This is why it has been said that Robredo has a ceiling. The voter base is limited in that respect and there is no room for conversion.
But we can never be too careful. At the hearing of the Senate Committee on Electoral Reforms and People Participation chaired by Sen. Imee Marcos, technological vulnerabilities of the Comelec system were brought out in the open. This is not actually Comelec’s system but Smartmatic’s as the technology service provider. The question which remains unasked and unanswered is why do we need to pay billions to a foreign company when we have a plethora of skilled programmers who can develop an organic automated election system?
It is about time that the public themselves ask these questions and demand answers from the concerned appointed and elected officials who are tasked with overseeing the electoral system. While we are it, the scope should be widened to the whole bureaucracy because the amount lost to corruption is staggering and we cannot afford to keep on lining the pockets of the corrupt at our expense.
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