It’s no fluke, apparently: Senator Grace Poe is still the leader in what remains a very tight race for President in May.
Elsewhere in this newspaper, we publish the January installment of The Standard Poll by Junie Laylo. The senator kept the lead that she held last December in the same survey, ahead of the three other major candidates for the highest post in the land —Vice President Jejomar Binay, former Secretary Mar Roxas and Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte.
Poe inched up a point from December, from 28 to 29 percent, in the Laylo survey, while Binay shed a point (23 to 22). Roxas stayed the same (22) to tie Binay and Duterte improved by one, as well, from 19 to 20.
What appears plain in The Standard Poll is that, four months before the May 9 elections, the likely voters of Poe remain convinced that she will not be disqualified. The smart airing of Poe’s ads insisting that she will remain on the ballot seems to have worked wonders for her, as well.
Another recent survey basically confirmed Laylo’s consistent findings over the past two months that Poe is still ahead of a field that is bunched together and refuses to be left behind, at this point, by a margin that can be considered comfortable. But Laylo has been saying that all along.
Yes, even Duterte has more than a fighting chance. And now that the Commission on Elections has also virtually cleared the Davao City mayor’s candidacy, Duterte may take a page from the Poe playbook and win more adherents to his side—if he can shed the image that his run sometimes can’t be taken seriously.
On the other hand, it does appear that Roxas is solidifying his hold in the Visayas provinces, particularly amongst his kasimanwas in the Ilonggo-speaking Region 6. Roxas still fares poorly in Metro Manila and Mindanao, but he’s showing marked improvement in other places.
As for Binay, he’s always in contention, even if he appears to be losing ground to both Poe and Roxas. Binay is almost always a close second in the major surveys—and we know how the Vice President nosed out Roxas for the second top spot in 2010, even if he was not even among the two highest-ranked candidates in the surveys for the longest time.
I’m sure the people who make a living out of reading the tea leaves that are provided regularly by the survey companies will be able to glean much more from Laylo’s latest poll. Suffice it to say, for the nonce, that this election promises to go down the proverbial wire.
The official campaign period starts today, after all. We won’t have too long to wait.
* * *
What I’m also waiting for is who gets to be held liable, after the Aquino administration steps down, for the wanton destruction of the Metro Rail Transit 3. And at the risk of being accused, like Senator Grace Poe, of merely copying the arguments of the private-sector developer of that all-but-abandoned railway, I think any post-Aquino court of law will find the last two transportation secretaries—Mar Roxas and Joseph Emilio Abaya—responsible for the mess over at the MRT.
MRT Holdings Corp. chairman Robert John Sobrepeña, who has been blamed by this administration for committing the supposed “original sin” that led to the train line’s virtual demise, has struck back at both Roxas and Abaya. Sobrepeña hailed the Senate report of Poe which recommended the filing of charges against Abaya—adding that Roxas should be included in the charges, as well.
It was Roxas, after all, who presided over the series of events that caused the mess over at the train line, according to Sobrepeña. “It was under [Roxas’] term that the Sumitomo [maintenance] contract was not renewed; that was the first mistake,” he explained.
“The second mistake was negotiating with [substitute maintenance contractor] PH Trams, which also happened during term of Secretary Roxas,” he added. “The third mistake was [committed by Abaya] when just two days after assuming office, he signed a contract prepared during the time of Secretary Roxas.”
The rest, according to Sobrepeña, is tragic history. When the Department of Transportation and Communications forced out Sumitomo, which had been maintaining the MRT without a glitch for so many years, and brought in the undercapitalized PH Trams, the quick decline of the train service followed.
The chopped-up maintenance contract was eventually consolidated (as it was under the Japanese company), but by then it was too late. And the firing of MRT general manager Al Vitangcol III did not stop the service’s decline, but only hastened the process and served just to identify a convenient scapegoat for both Roxas and Abaya.
If there is any real justice that can be had after President Noynoy Aquino steps down and both Abaya and Roxas are finally subjected to a real investigation, this is what they will find: Both Roxas and Aquino ruined the MRT—and they should both be made to pay for it.