Duterte and Bongbong will win, if....

By Alfredo C. Garvida Jr.

Contributor

By the time this piece comes out of print, the national elections will be over and by then, we will know who our next leaders will be in both the local and national levels.

I was invited by the party list KGB, headed by Gov. Antonio Cerilles of Zamboanga Del Sur and Atty. Felipe Favila to attend and cover the "miting de avance" of vice presidential candidate, Ferdinand Bongbong Marcos, Jr., which was held in Mandaluyong on May 5, 2016.

The "miting de avance" was originally scheduled to be held at the Luneta Park but for reasons unknown, the organizers shifted the venue to Mandaluyong. I went to the venue with Atty. Favila and his group but we were late and Bongbong's speech was already past halfway to finish. Our group had to walk more than ten blocks around to get into a vantage point as the crowd was immense, scattered around in several blocks to view the center stage via a great number of giant screens.

As a journalist and sometimes politician, I have had the privilege of following Bongbong Marcos' political discourses all these years but never before had I witnessed his extraordinaire oratorical power until that evening. His delivery was flawless, extremely passionate and emotionally imposing. His message was clear: This nation needs healing from the divisive rhetoric and stratagem of politicians just to gain advantage over their political rivals. He laid down his program on crime and the economy—touching on the transportation woes commuters are now suffering daily—and advocated for an inclusive society under the watchful eyes of a just government.

It is this column's observation that BBM sounded more like a presidential candidate than a vice presidential one; and he outdistanced his rivals in the VP race by a mile in the context of governance plan and execution. One has to wonder if his oratorical prowess is what has endeared him with the public or his being unjustly crucified by his enemies for sins he had not done or simply because of he is the only son and namesake of the late president, whose fate in history has yet to receive an assessment from disinterested historians, vis-a-vis a unilateral judgment of people averse to him and his family.

Bongbong lamented in his speech, which this writer supports, that the last Pulse Asia survey reflected a 7% turnaround against him in just two days. In Pulse Asia's previous survey, BBM was 5% ahead of Leni Robredo, his closest rival. After 2 days, its new survey indicated that Leni was now ahead by 2%. And there was nothing unusual or spectacular that she or he may have done during the intervening period. This Pulse Asia's last survey differed by 3% from the last survey of SWS which was made 2 days later and which reflected that BBM was 1% ahead of Leni. 

What these numbers indicate is that the race for the vice presidency is extremely close. This column believes however that barring any unspectacular shift of numbers to favor Leni, Bongbong will win the vice presidency by a substantial margin. Why? Because the citizenship of the surveys made by both Pulse Asia and SWS did not include the INC voters. Why? Because the INC voters would not give a preference as to whom they should vote when asked until the central leadership of the church decrees whom they should vote for. And the surveys were done before the INC, which carries about 4%of the nationwide votes, announced that they were supporting Bongbong for vice president. Granting that the surveys were correct then, the bottom line would be: Bongbong will beat Leni by 2% under Pulse Asia's indications, and 5% under SWS's. 

Reports have reached this column however three days before the elections that there were intensive negotiations between the Liberal Party, particularly President Aquino, and some political power brokers to thwart the seemingly unimpeded march of Mayor Duterte to the presidency. The negotiations centered on the withdrawal of Sen. Grace Poe from the race and the dumping of Sen. Bongbong Marcos by the power brokers who had originally pledged to support him. The Poe scenario is next to impossible to happen, given the lady senator's tested probity. The Bongbong scenario could happen, but the big question is why must BBM be sacrificed just to put down Duterte? If this is not a simple personal agenda of President Aquino, what must it be characterized otherwise? The equation would be: the power brokers failed on Duterte, then turned their backs on BBM to support Aquino's vice presidential bet, what is left for them in the future then that a lame duck LP and/or Leni could give that Bongbong could not? 

Without the above scenario, and barring any cheating, Duterte and Bongbong will be the next top two leaders of the country at noon of June 30, 2016.