No. 1 or 4 hardly matters ISSUES CLEAR, CHOICE SIMPLE; DUTERTE WILL PREVAIL IN 2016

By Manny Piñol

Friends have been burning the lines asking me if the latest survey results showing Presidential candidate Rody Duterte at No. 2 and No. 4 bothered me at all.

It would have been the height of hypocrisy had I told them I was unaffected. In fact, my first reaction was “What?”

Pulse Asia ranked Duterte No. 2 behind Vice President Jejomar Binay and slightly ahead of Senator Grace Poe, who has been disqualified by the Commission on Elections over citizenship and residency issues.

The Social Weather Station (SWS) had him ranked lower at No. 4, believe it or not, behind perennial tail-ender Mar Roxas.

The two results were the part of the monthly surveys conducted by Pulse Asia and SWS prior to the elections of 2016.

Two weeks ago, a commissioned survey conducted after Duterte decided to join the presidential race showed him on top in almost all classes.

This was validated by a Magdalo Party survey conducted recently.

While some may question the accuracy of the latest surveys, there is simply no point arguing or debating over the numbers gathered by both survey firms.

Duterte is nonchalant. He has previously declared that whatever his ranking in the surveys would be does not really matter to him at all.

A reluctant candidate who only decided to run for the Presidency after so much urging from the people, Duterte says he is offering himself to the country in response to the call for him to lead.

“I will not die if I do not become President,” he earlier said.

Unlike other presidential camps who griped against “biased surveys” when they were low but celebrated when the numbers showed them on top, Duterte spokesman Peter Tiu Laviña looks at the figures from a different view.

He said what is interesting in the results of the regular monthly survey is the steady rise of the Davao City Mayor.

In the SWS survey, Duterte climbed from 11% to 20% in the most recent polling, or a rise of 9%.

Pete Laviña was right. In fact, a graph made by SWS showing the gathering of mass support for presidential candidates, indicated a downward trend for Poe and Binay, a flat line for Roxas and a steady climb for Duterte.

How do I look at this development?

First, it has to be admitted that Duterte’s stock was really affected by the Pope Francis gaffe.

That joke-gone-too-far offended a lot of Catholics who had previously supported him.

To his credit, Duterte has apologised for the offensive joke and humbly received a “sermon” from Davao Archbishop Romulo Valles.

Lately, his public speeches have been noticeably more “behaved” and he promised he would penalise himself P1,000 for each cuss word he utters.

Was the Pope Francis joke-gone-too-far faux pas fatal to his presidential bid?

I don’t believe so.

The blunder, if that unfortunate joke could be called as such, happened early on and I believe that with six months more to go before the elections, people will get to know the real Duterte, a compassionate person with a penchant to crack green jokes and blurt out expletives.

It was a blessing in disguise that it happened and people reacted the way they did because it sent a very clear message to Duterte: stay on focus with the problems confronting the country and slow down on the green jokes and the vulgar language because not everybody could tolerate these.

When the pain eases and people start to realise that the election of the next President should be based on who could address the problems confronting the country, Duterte will stand out as the only choice.

Drugs, Criminality, Corruption, Communist Insurgency and the Bangsamoro Unrest.

These are the most serious problems confronting the country today.

Poe, even granting she had not been disqualified, does not have the track record to show she could handle these problems.

Miriam Defensor-Santiago is not campaigning and hardly talks about these issues.

Binay has not made a strong position on drugs, criminality, the Communist Insurgency and the Bangsamoro problem. Worse, he is bedraggled by corruption charges.

Roxas, as Interior and Local Government Secretary and head of the Philippine National Police, has nothing to show on drugs and criminality and has flip-flopped on the Bangsamoro demand for self-governance.

In the final reckoning, people will realise that Duterte is the only Presidential candidate who could confront drug dealers, criminals and corruption. He has the track record.

He is the only Presidential candidate who could talk to the New People’s Army and is idolised and respected by the Bangsamoro.

Beyond the issues of womanising, cussing and alleged human rights violations, Duterte will stand out as the only choice.

That is the moment when the chaffs are separated from the grain and Duterte will prevail in 2016.

(Using this photo I took of the crowd that mobbed Duterte when he visited the COMELEC offices two weeks ago and a photo of Mar Roxas visiting typhoon victims in Samar downloaded from the Facebook page Basta Bisaya Guwapo og Gwapa, people would have an idea of who’s loved and who’s not.)