Back in 2021, nobody thought that a probable Marcos-Duterte or Duterte-Marcos tandem would have a huge lead over their rivals. Most people thought it would be a repeat of the 2016 race because of the number of Presidential candidates being a minimum of four.
Despite the attendant drama accompanying what eventually became the Marcos-Duterte tandem, the public and the rival candidates were surprised at how popular the team was across the economic brackets. There was no damage to the Duterte brand even if there has been a systematic effort to bring it down in the past five years.
These efforts have been largely unsuccessful. It has achieved its goal only amongst the elite who are virulently anti-Duterte and anti-Marcos. But despite this, there is the emerging trend of the promotion of mixed-tickets in the race for the top two political posts in the country. Why is this so?
Politicos are always on the lookout for loopholes in the system which they can exploit to their advantage. This is evident in each election cycle. In 1992, Fidel Ramos won as President but had Joseph Estrada as his Vice-President. Joseph Estrada won by a landslide in 1998 but Gloria Macapagal Arroyo became his Vice-President. In 2010, Benigno Aquino won the Presidency but Jejomar Binay won as Vice-President. In 2016, Rodrigo Duterte emerged victorious but had to contend with Leonor Robredo as his Vice-President.
In the last two weeks of the campaign in the 2016 cycle, Bi-Leni began appearing on tarpaulins and social media. Binay-Leni. At this point, it was obvious that Mar Roxas was going to lose while Robredo was in a close race with Marcos. Binay was deemed to have more appeal with the D and E demographic. It was a Hail Mary Pass strategy which failed as Binay finished a distant fourth.
In the current election cycle, some groups are out to dump Marcos and pair Sara Duterte with Leni Robredo and Isko Moreno. Thus, RoSa and IsSa have been formally launched by the groups backing these split-ticket tandems.
To begin with, you wonder who is financing the more visible RoSa effort. Joey Salceda has been flying around the country promoting the same. It was formally launched in Cagayan De Oro and has been adopted by the pro-Robredo groups in Misamis Oriental. The same is true in Zamboanga City.
IsSa is being supported by the pro-Isko group in Central Mindanao which is under the auspices of the Mangudadatu clan and the pro-Duterte, anti-Marcos faction in Malacanan, which was pushing for Sen. Bong Go as Sara’s running mate.
There is also the Switch to Isko and Switch to Leni efforts being pushed. Both of these are meant to take away votes from the survey leader Marcos, who is on track to win the Presidency in May. The question is, is there any traction being generated?
One News of the MVP group has put out a new program on Cignal, Optics, hosted by Mon Isberto. Reputation Architect Amor Maclang dissects the BBM media campaign with Isberto, who seems disappointed with her assessment that Marcos “owns” YouTube and TikTok as social media platforms promoting his candidacy.
Maclang goes further to say that the public is identifying with Marcos’ non-belligerent attitude towards his detractors. Ignorance is bliss so to speak, but it is more like why surrender to the narrative to your rivals by reacting to their black propaganda campaign? It is best to keep your eyes on the ball and prize.
The opposition has been engaed in force projection with their “huge” crowds. But the question is, are they actually converting voters? Are these events political rallies or concerts or a hybrid of the two in order to pack the crowd in? Again the best gauge is scientific surveys which the opposition are also shunning and discrediting because they all show Marcos leading.
The high level of entitlement, impertinence and lack of respect for contrarian opinions is taking its toll on the Robredo campaign. With 45 days to go, they are now embarking on a house-to-house campaign in an effort to convince voters to switch to Robredo if they are not voting for her. These efforts are being led by Aika and Tricia Robredo. Jillian is also on the campaign trail in New York among Fil-American communities in the city and in New Jersey.
In the case of Isko, the campaign for local elective posts began last Friday and he is now being hounded by the sale of the Divisoria Mall, which is a patrimonial property of the City of Manila, to a private group without the benefit of public bidding. There is bound to be more of these questionable transactions surfacing as the campaign goes on given his designated successor, Honey Lacuna, has three other rivals for the Mayoralty post.
The most explosive political news last week was Reporma President Pantaleon Alvarez dumping Ping Lacson for Leni Robredo. But as it turns out, the move was not of the whole party but only on Alvarez’s party in his Davao Del Norte bailiwick. Why Robredo chose to accept Alvarez’s endorsement should be questioned by the “purists” in her camp. But apparently, Robredo is desperate and so she will accept any endorsement even if it has been tainted by Lacson’s claim that he was dumped because he could not produce the P800M campaign funds that Alvarez’s Chief of Staff asked from him. In any event, Alvarez cannot guarantee to Robredo that all of his constituents will be voting for her. Barry Gutierrez quickly denied that money changed hands between Robredo and Alvarez but it was obvious that the deal had been cut prior to Robredo’s sortie in the Davao region.
The Marcos juggernaut continues with the leading candidate acquitting himself well in the second edition of the SMNI Presidential Forum over the weekend. The April survey numbers will determine if his rivals have moved the needle or not in their respective campaigns. Should Marcos maintain his lead, it would be safe to say that he will be the 17th President of the Republic come June 30.
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