Is it game over? (3)

PHILIPPINES - In Brief 30 Mar 2022 by Romeo Bernardo

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Notwithstanding aerial photos in social media showing a sea of pink in Vice President Leni Robredo’s campaign rallies, pink being her signature color, surveys suggest that the impressive attendances are hardly making a dent on her poll numbers. The latest figures we’ve seen, done by The Laylo Report, an outfit manned by old hands in the polling business, show the late dictator’s son, Ferdinand Marcos, Jr., still enjoying an overwhelming lead of over 60% of the votes. Even surveys commissioned by private parties friendly to the Vice President, which were confidentially shared with us, showed that while Mr. Marcos has suffered a marked drop in voter share over the last month, he is still way ahead of his competitors and his loss has not translated into meaningful gains for the Vice President. Perhaps to precipitate a bandwagon effect and prevent possible further erosion in Mr. Marcos’s scores, major political parties, including the President’s and former-Senator-now-business tycoon Manuel Villar’s, as well as another prominent businessman with extensive investments in the country’s infrastructure, have recently stepped out of the shadows to publicly endorse Mr. Marcos’s candidacy. With a sense of inevitability creeping up on many, pundits have begun looking beyond May 9, election day, and wonder at what a Marcos 2.0 presidency would look like. From what we’ve heard on the ground, the views fall into two camps depending on whether one believes Mr. Marcos is seeking redemption or retribution. Per the redemption view, Mr. Marcos wants to rebrand the family name and dissociate it from the publicized excesses during his father’s 20-year rule. Following this narrative, he will...