JOE III LEADS CONGRESS POLL: Survey also shows Iloilo City voters’ top concerns are jobs, aid and nepotism

Iloilo City voters will pick former mayor Atty. Jose “Joe III” Espinosa as their next congressman in the May 2022 elections, according to the latest survey by an independent group of political-science graduate students from some of the country’s top universities.

About 75% of likely voters across the city’s 180 barangays chose Espinosa as their next congressman, compared with 15% for incumbent Julienne “Jam-Jam” Baronda and 10% for Plaridel Nava.

The survey was conducted on September 27 to October 3, 2021 just after Espinosa confirmed his plans to vie for Iloilo City’s lone congressional district. Nava subsequently announced that he would run for city councilor and would endorse Espinosa as his group’s congressional candidate.

The survey also showed that Iloilo City voters want candidates in the upcoming elections to focus on jobs, livelihood and financial assistance amid the economic difficulties due to the Covid19 pandemic. They also want a sustained campaign against political favoritism and corruption.

“We did this survey to determine the key concerns of Iloilo City voters,” said Ivan Evangelista, a political-science graduate student of the Ateneo de Manila University, who is part of the survey group.

The group is composed of graduate-student researchers from Ateneo De Manila University, University of San Carlos, and the University of the Philippines in Diliman. The students are taking up master’s degrees in political science, sociology and public management.

The survey used multi-stage probability sampling with a margin of error of plus or minus 5% and a 95% level of confidence.

The respondents were residents who are currently 18 years old or above, and those who will be 18 years old by the May 2022 elections, and who are registered voters or intend to be registered voters of the lone district of Iloilo City.

The independent surveyors said they distributed their two-page questionnaires face-to-face while observing proper social distancing as required by health regulations. The respondents were asked to answer 12 questions, along with their comments and other feedback.

The survey covered all 180 barangays in the districts of City Proper, Lapaz, Molo, Lapuz, Jaro, Mandurriao and Arevalo.

A total of 1,000 questionnaires were distributed but only 890 respondents submitted complete answers. The surveyors said 85 of the respondents chose Undecided when asked about their congressional candidate while 25 did not indicate their choice at all.

Of the 890 respondents who completed the questionnaire, 668 likely voters or 75% said they would vote for Espinosa as their congressman in the May 2022 elections, 134 (15%) chose Baronda while 88 (about 10%) picked Nava. This means that 11% of the total number of target respondents were Undecided or did not specify their choice.

Espinosa led among male and female survey respondents, and across all age groups, socio-economic classes and educational levels of the survey samples, the surveyors said.

About 20% of the respondents were 31-40 years old, 38% were 41-50 years old, 23% were 51-60 years old, and the rest did not indicate their age. Nine out of 10 of the respondents said they would likely vote in the coming elections.

Asked about their awareness of the likely congressional candidates, 52% of the respondents said they heard about the candidates via TV, 44% at social or community events, 38% were through their projects, 32% from their family members, 23% via various print media, 12% from radio, and 26% via social media. The respondents were given multiple choices. More than eight out of 10 respondents said they have Facebook accounts.

Based on the qualitative component of the survey, 66% of the respondents said existing city and congressional district leaders were sometimes not in the right direction to benefit their constituents. In terms of transparency, 91% of the respondents said the city government leadership needed to improve transparency, while 85% said Iloilo City’s congressional office lacked transparency. About eight out of 10 respondents believed both the current city and congressional administrations needed to exert more effort to fight corruption.

Asked to rate their satisfaction with the current city and congressional leadership, 47% said they were Very Dissatisfied, 20% were Satisfied, 15% were Dissatisfied, 10% were Somewhat Satisfied, while 8% were Very Satisfied.

Among the top concerns raised by the respondents were: inequality in the treatment of people by both the city and congressional administrations, lack of job opportunities, confusion over the charging of swabbing tests for Covid19, difficulty in getting help from local political leaders, and poor delivery of social services to communities.

“Aside from congressional preferences, we also wanted to know how political families have emerged, captured, maintained and expanded their power in the political arena in Iloilo City,” Evangelista said. “We are consolidating our field reports to see a much clearer picture of the Ilonggo political behavior and evaluate the suggestions and comments from the respondents, especially on how local leaders render their obligations to their constituents.”

Evangelista said they would likely conduct two more surveys before the May 2022 elections to determine how Ilonggo voters choose their local leaders.

“We hope our study will help graduate students in sociology, political science and public administration – as well as political leaders – in gaining much better insights on effective governance, power and public accountability,” Evangelista said.