Atheista -

Running a campaign for a senatorial seat is not cheap. I’ve always wondered how people would willingly throw millions down the drain in the face of prospects that are almost nil. The only senatoriable who lost an election badly (out of the top 20) to ever make it to the winners’ circle in the past four elections is Jamby Madrigal. She definitely spent a lot more money during her 2004 campaign compared to her “who-the-hell-are-you” lukewarm attempt in 2001 as a member of the Puwersa ng Masa.

I will be comparing the October poll numbers for 2007 with the final COMELEC tally and see who among the 2010 hopefuls can still cross their fingers and hope for the best.

This was how the October 2007 survey results looked:

There were twelve slots up for grabs for 2007 and based on the October-November numbers for Pulse Asia, there were nineteen senatoriables who had a realistic chance of winning one of the seats. Of these nineteen, ten where projected to be sure winners had the elections been held six months earlier. These ten included Loren Legarda, Panfilo Lacson, Francis Pangilinan, Manuel Villar, Alan Peter Cayetano, Tito Sotto, Ralph Recto, Korina Sanchez, Koko Pimentel and Gringo Honasan. Interestingly, of these “sure bets”, four ultimately failed to win a seat – Sanchez didn’t run while former senators Sotto and Recto (Team UNITY – the administration slate) dropped off the list (Recto ended up at #14 while Sotto was over three million votes short of the twelfth spot at #19. Genuine Opposition candidate Koko Pimentel was controversially beaten by some twenty thousand votes and finished at #13.

Loren Legarda was able to hold on to the top spot of the surveys and eventually clinched the highest vote total as well for the senate. Ping Lacson finished at third while Villar,Pangilinan, Cayetano and Honasan finished at 4th, 5th, 9th and 10th.

That means that out of the upper half of the circle of 19 (again, the people projected to win sic months before the polls), only 6 out of 10 managed to win. This leaves us with six more slots to discuss.

Of the remaining nine people who had a statistical chance of winning, four chose to not run – former Senator Loi Ejercito, JV Ejercito, Imee Marcos and Ruffy Biazon. This leaves us with Edgardo Angara, Noynoy Aquino, Chiz Escudero, John Osmena and Joker Arroyo.

Chiz Escudero experienced one of the most meteoric rises ever seen in pre-election polls to actual vote counts. From being considered as a long shot half a year before the elections, Escudero was within three hundred thousand votes of overtaking Loren Legarda as the top vote getter for the 2007 Senatorial elections. Noynoy Aquino, Edgardo Angara and Joker Arroyo all secured slots as well – positions six through eight, respectively.

John Osmena continued his losing streak as he languished at the 20th spot.

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Out of the 19 people who made it to the threshold of possibly winning, only fifteen ran. Of these fifteen, ten were able to win seats – and the five who lost were somewhere between positions 13 and 20.

The question is, who were the two people who made it into the actual winners’ circle?

Easy, Antonio Trillanes and Miguel Zubiri. Quite fittingly, there occupied the last two slots.

Trillanes was projected at best as a 42nd placer six months before the elections. Zubiri’s name wasn’t even on the survey sheet.

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So while the October surveys gives an idea of more than half of the possible winners, never discount the people who might suddenly pop up. To be fair to Pulse Asia, they did get right during their last survey (just a few weeks before election day). Eleven of the twelve who won were in the projected list of winners. Only Trillanes was outside the top 14. Interestingly, Trillanes was able to boost his measly rating of 3.1 (Oct 06) to 22.0 (Apr 07) while incarcerated for rebellion charges.

Zubiri certainly spent a ton on TV advertisements down the stretch and he did benefit from being one of the more likeable people (i.e. people without much political baggage) from Team Unity.

So what do the numbers tell us?

1) Polls taken half a year before the elections can be a good gauge on who wins – especially those in the upper half.

2) Beware of the “sure thing”.

3) Candidates who have a a seemingly small shot can still turn things around given the adequate amount of money for TV ads/ coverage for rebellion charges!

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Here’s the latest Pulse Survey/ Feel free to read into it.

Reference: Pulse Asia

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