More than half of Filipinos remain optimistic that President Rodrigo Duterte will be able to fulfill most, if not all, of his promises despite a 10-point drop in his ratings since he took office in June, the latest Social Weather Stations Survey showed.
The First Quarter survey, conducted among 1,200 respondents, found 52 percent of Filipinos believe that Duterte can make good of his promises, with 17 percent saying “all or nearly all” can be accomplished and 35 percent believing he can fulfill “most” of his promises.
However, the number of Filipinos who expect that most, if not all, of Duterte’s promises will be fulfilled stood at 63 percent in June 2016, slid down to 56 percent in September, and went down further to 53 percent in March 2017.
Part of the survey findings released earlier showed that many Filipinos support the President even though his trust and approval ratings slipped to 76 percent, a significant seven-point drop from 83 percent in December 2016.
Duterte’s performance ratings also slipped by five percentage points to 78 percent in March from the 83 percent he obtained last year.
Disapproval and distrust ratings of the President were set at 7 percent and 5 percent, respectively, while indecision toward his performance and trustworthiness stood at 15 percent and 18 percent of respondents, respectively.
Duterte’s trust and approval ratings remained high in his home region, Mindanao, at 88 percent and 90 percent, respectively, while he obtained the lowest trust and approval scores in Balance Luzon and the National Capital Region.
Malacañang blamed the significant drop in Duterte’s trust and approval ratings to the “seemingly orchestrated events” organized by the administration’s critics to dampen support for the President.
Still, the high approval rating overall showed that the majority of Filipinos appreciate Duterte’s decisiveness, said Presidential Spokesman Ernesto Abella.
During the survey period, a party-list lawmaker filed an impeachment complaint against Duterte.
At the Senate, a self-confessed but perjured assassin tagged Duterte as the leader of the Davao Death Squad when he was still Davao City mayor; human rights groups attacked the administration’s anti-drug campaign; and Vice President Leni Robredo issued a video message attacking the administration’s war on drugs that was to be shown at a United Nations meeting.