Straw polls

Conducting surveys on the electorate’s preference for certain candidates to a position may be useful to the candidates themselves during the campaign period. It gives them a more or less accurate assessment of their chances in winning the election and of their weakest links that need urgent repair in their drive to capture the seat they seek. The services of the pollsters are undoubtedly a big help to the candidates in plotting their political strategies or amending them to bolster their chances or assure success. Candidates should therefore consider the surveys as useful not only when the results are favorable to them, but more so when they are unfavorable. Otherwise, they should not rely on, or use those surveys from the very start. Accepting and using only the agreeable results betrays a weakness in character, a refusal to face reality that puts their fitness for the office in grave doubt. Such attitude may even indicate that these candidates intend to use the surveys for the purpose of fomenting unrest if they lose the elections. In the hands of these candidates, survey results are not useful but may be dangerous.

And this danger is enhanced since survey results are not only for the private use of the candidates but also for public consumption. Those who commissioned the pollsters usually go to the press if the results are favorable to them. Such practice of periodically headlining the results of the surveys up to a few days before the elections has more disadvantages than advantages to the conduct of a free, honest and most accurate political exercise to find out the true voice of the people. The methods used may be most scientific as the pollsters tout them to be. Nevertheless, it cannot be denied that said surveys results, no matter how scientifically obtained, essentially identify the most popular but not the most qualified candidates. I am almost sure that those polled usually make their choices on the basis of name recall without bothering to tell "why" they choose a particular candidate even if asked. There is always the risk that the highly gullible voting public who are fed these survey results may hitch a ride on the bandwagon and go for the winner. Even the thinking voters who usually choose on the basis of qualification may be carried away by the trending since his choices are not in the winners’ circle.

It looks like pre-election surveys have already become part of our electoral process. Several pollsters are now engaged in presumably a most lucrative business of sampling voter preferences. To be sure, they seem to be reputable enough to be trusted. Nevertheless, since they have become an important part of the political exercise potentially affecting the outcome of the election, their operation must likewise be regulated as the campaign of the candidates is regulated and subjected to certain rules. Such regulation becomes more imperative when survey results of the different survey groups differ as to the supposed "winner" of the poll conducted over the same period thereby raising doubts on their accuracy and causing further confusion. A law should be passed giving the Comelec or any other government agency the authority to supervise and control survey groups’ operations, their methods and the manner of releasing the results of their voter samplings. The law should specifically limit the release of the survey results to the public as to frequency and timing. Surveys should not be conducted anymore within thirty days prior to an election. Any survey conducted within that period should only be done privately for the candidates and should not be for public consumption. Severe sanctions should be imposed both on the pollsters and candidates found guilty of violating the rules on the conduct of straw polls.

E-mail: jcson@info.com.ph