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If Presidential elections were held today, Roco will win, IBON survey says

If presidential elections are held today, it is mostly that Education Secretary Raul Roco would place first, ousted President Joseph Estrada would place second and the current president, Mrs. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, would only take a poor a third.

In a pre-election national survey conducted last July 11-28, IBON Foundation, an independent think tank, revealed that a majority – 19.96% of the total number of those who responded to the question, “If Presidential elections were held today, who would you choose for President?” – chose Roco, 14.08% chose Estrada, with Mrs. Arroyo getting only 11.13%.

Mrs. Arroyo also lost in a recent survey conducted by the NGO Center for Women’s Resources (CWR) among 1800 Metro Manila women. When asked if they would vote for Mrs. Arroyo if she runs in the 2004 Presidential elections, a majority (63%) of the women respondents said, “no.” 13% responded, “yes,” and 22% remained undecided.

Only about 47% of the 1,014 respondents surveyed by IBON all over the country registered their choice for president. The rest – 53.06% - were undecided. The actual presidential elections will be held in May 2004 yet.

Roco ran for the presidency in 1998 but lost to Estrada. Angara, who ran for vice-president with Estrada lost to Mrs. Arroyo.

Estrada was ousted from the presidency by a peaceful people’s uprising in January last year and was replaced by Mrs. Arroyo.

In the top 6, Roco, Estrada and Arroyo were followed by Sen. Panfilo Lacson (4.54%); Sen. Loren Legarda (3.55%) movie actor Fernando Poe Jr. and Vice President Teofisto Guingona (2.47% each.

The IBON survey was conducted in the National Capital Region, Southern Tagalog, Bicol, the Ilocos provinces, Cordillera, Central Luzon, Eastern Visayas, Western Visayas and in the four regions of Mindanao. It has a sample base of 1,014 respondents selected from different sectors and has a margin of error of +/-5%.