How can Secretary De Lima be marketed as the next President?
QUESTION: We’ve read and liked your previous column on how to market Sen. Grace Poe for the 2016 presidential election. Will you now please diagnose another unexpected likely candidate?
We’re a group of educators who are very concerned about President Pnoy’s successor. Here’s our question. The recent NBI raid led by Secretary de Lima herself brings to mind that a determined and dedicated public official can get things done, even if one or two of the sections in the bureaucracy under her wings are corrupt.
As one of the country’s survey research experts, do you think Secretary de Lima’s recent accomplishment counts as a “tipping point” for a De-Lima-for-President movement? How can she be successfully marketed as our next President?
Suitable alternative
ANSWER: Just last October, I diagnosed the chances of Sen. Grace Poe becoming our next President. In light of the continuing decline in VP Binay’s share of votes for the presidency as well as Secretary Mar Roxas’ lackluster record in the same polls, both voters and political parties are now in an intense and intensifying search for Pnoy’s suitable replacement.
“Suitable” with respect to what? That’s with respect to what will be Pnoy’s most likely lasting legacy, namely, the perceived effectiveness of his anti-corruption campaign.
Those responsible for strategizing how to bring down VP Binay’s extremely high share of votes in the polls picked the right issue of perceived corruption.
The science of consumer behavior tells us that perception matters more in shaping voter behavior than reality.
The choice of being pro-poor worked well for VP Binay’s camp until the Blue Ribbon Committee reversed the picture and the perception of corruption reared its ugly head.
Remember that ex-President Erap won as the ultimate pro-poor champion and it was the perception of evidence-based corruption—even though unproven—which was his undoing.
That was a lesson the Binay political strategists missed.
Now on to your question. Let’s diagnose according to several key factors.
The first has to do with voter behavior and what we’ve learned about it.
While there are three or four other factors to take into account, it’s voter behavior that must be considered first.
SWS surveys as well as my own regarding voter behavior showed that in the presidential elections held after the time of President Cory, voters voted according to two interacting “forces:” (1) What the candidate has done or is perceived to be capable of doing (70 percent), and (2) What kind of a “personality” he/she has (30 percent).
In the case of Senator Poe, what are the variables working for her? Her topping the last senatorial election is one. But that factor belongs more to the personality determinant than to the has-done/capable-of-doing factor. So we must admit that this is not such a strong point. Secretary Roxas also topped the senatorial race but that did not help his vice presidential candidacy.
Perceived strengths
I had pointed out that under this same factor are Senator Poe’s two other perceived “strengths,” namely, having a popular father and a clean image.
Her pushing for Senate approval of the Freedom of Information bill is a has-done factor. And having the support of both political parties is a “political machinery” factor, although in Senator Poe’s case, it’s only a mild variant of it.
We’ll get back to this political machinery consideration as the second significant variable in the equation for winning a presidential election in a while.
In the case of Secretary de Lima, Senator Poe is not exactly the analytically correct benchmark candidate to compare to. Senator Poe was elected. Secretary de Lima is an appointed public servant.
So let me switch diagnostic frameworks and proceed according to my winning share-of-vote formula framework and return to the capability to perform framework after.
Winning chances
According to this alternative though related strategizing, a presidential candidate’s winning share of votes is the result of that candidate’s voter awareness ratio multiplied by his/her trust ratio multiplied by his/her voter intention to vote ratio.
We do not have data yet on the third ratio for Secretary de Lima. But we have time series data on the first two ratios: awareness and trust.
Over the past years’ series of polls, Secretary de Lima and Secretary Dinky Soliman topped the ratings in both awareness and trust. Between the two ratios, it is the trust ratio that is a more significant variable in the final share of votes equation. Awareness is largely a matter of traditional, non-traditional and social media reach, frequency and continuity. On the other hand, trust embodies the essence of the voting behavior: 70 percent what the candidate has done or is capable of doing, and 30 percent what personality the candidate projects.
Between De Lima and Soliman, the available data tell us that De Lima has gone way ahead of Soliman. Now, in terms of fit as the suitable successor to President Pnoy, while there is no hard data to invoke, De Lima is also far ahead of Soliman or even Senator Poe. Secretary de Lima has repeatedly proven herself as the President’s “anti-corruption czar and implementor.”
So on the basis of likely voter perception and behavior, you have everything in favor of starting a De-Lima-for-President movement.
To lend a reality test to this idea, bring in and carefully analyze the other factor of political machinery and supporting organization. And what about the 30 percent personality consideration?
My friends in the advertising creative circle have this to say: “She’s got genuine drama and proven guts that make her natural to project as our Margaret Thatcher. She’s got that ‘destiny’ ingredient you found missing in Senator Poe.”
Keep your questions coming. Send them to me at [email protected].
