Did SWS flirt with its client?
By Mortz C. Ortigoza
Polls like what two major Philippines survey outfits’ Social Weather Station (SWS) and Pulse Asia (PA) have been doing became a major factor for the strategy of an elective candidate to map out how he /she improves his /her weakness or strength in an area or stop his/her endeavor to save time, efforts, and monies as election nears.
Earlier, some political kibitzers criticized SWS how it came with 137% total sampling respond on its September 2 to 5 2016 presidential polls where it found 47% for Senator Grace Poe, 39% for Local Government Secretary Mar Roxas, 35% for Vice President Jejomar Binay, and 16% for Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte as against the standard practiced of a 100% based percentile poll.
The credibility of SWS had been questioned again by some sectors when it came days later with Survey No. 2 that was polled in the same September 2 to 5, 2015 period of Survey No.1 where a presidential aspirant Roxas landed No. 2 in the first survey while he landed No.3 in the second poll.
In No.1 poll, the top four presidential wannabes were sparsely distributed from each other while they were densely distributed in the No.2 poll. How these happen my dear SWS President Mahar Mangahas when those who were asked to answer were the same 1,200 people?
With 1,200 respondents divided by the 100% based percentile, the No.2 survey says 26% Poe, 24% Binay, 20% Roxas, 11% Duterte, 4% Roxas, 4% Senator Francis Escudero, 3% Manila Mayor Joseph Estrada, 2% Senator Merriam Santiago, 1% former Senator Manuel Villar, and 5% undecided and others.
Was there a manipulation that ensued in the Ranks 2 and 3 (between Roxas and Binay) to appease a customer after he saw how close the race for the presidential office?
Why the distance, in Survey No. 2, of Binay to Grace became statistically tied and that of Roxas to Binay became almost tied as based on the margin of error (MoE) of plus 3 or minus 3?
Why survey No. 2 differed to survey No. 1 when, again, they have the same interviewees?
From the projection of 60 million voters that would go at the voting precincts in 2016, each plus or minus is 600,000 votes. Does your math how the distances of each candidate to those behind or above them count.
In Survey No.1, SWS said that Poe dusted off by 8% or 4.8 million votes Binay. If you add the 3 plus or 3 minus MoE that 4.8 million could be 6.6 million votes or 3 million votes.
Why the wide discrepancy on Survey No.1 versus Survey No.2?
