Highlight of the week was what is touted to be the grand rally of all Yellowtard grand rallies held Sunday at chi chi Emerald Avenue in Ortigas Centre, Pasig City one of the wealthiest business districts in Metro Manila and just a few blocks away from the epicentre of the crowd that made up the original 1986 “EDSA Revolution”. According to communist “journalist” Inday Espina Varona, the crowd of people who presumably showed up to express support for Yellowtard presidential candidate Leni Robredo was estimated at more than 80,000 before 5pm.
It is worth considering that two of Metro Manila's major arteries intersect nearby — Epifanio delos Santos Avenue (EDSA) which connects the densely-populated northern and southern districts of the metropolis by both bus and rail and Ortigas Avenue which is connected to the even more densely-populated Marikina Valley and the area formerly known as the Province of Rizal. It is therefore not much of a logistics challenge to mobilise and haul warm bodies onto the site, particularly yesterday being a Sunday when millions of Filipinos — at the very least, even a fraction of the more than 20 million who reside in the metropolis and its outlying suburbs — have a bit of free time to spare.
Will these impressive crowds translate to votes big enough in numbers to narrow the enormous lead of administration candidates Bongbong Marcos and Sara Duterte? That's like asking whether a crowd numbering less than 100,000 and clearly made up primarily of one candidate’s supporters are sufficiently representative of a voter population of more than 60 million people that harbour a diverse range of partisan inclinations.
This is the very same argument that casts shade on the crowds that trooped to EDSA and went on to constitute the 1986 “EDSA Revolution”. These crowds were presumed to be representative of an entire nation’s desire to end the regime of then President Ferdinand Marcos. But then, without the benefit of an objective and institutional accounting of the people’s will (as a legal election or referendum would have delivered), it was all just left to the edict of the “winners” of what eventually came to be revealed as a mere garden-variety coup d'etat and not the “people's revolution” the occasion went on to be branded as. That edict and the narrative spun off it went on to remain practically unchallenged for three decades.
There is no evidence that the needle has moved as far as more objective and mathematically-sound surveys conducted by reputable firms. However, one cannot discount the influence such successful shows of force such as that of the Emerald Avenue rally yesterday could have on voter preferences. The challenge, as always, is how to measure how many actual voters had been converted.
Last week’s blog posts
The Ukrainian crisis: why Filipinos must be pragmatic
March 15, 2022 by The Unpopular Opinion
"On social media, Filipino netizens strongly denounce Russia’s aggressive military actions, even though it is noticeable that a significant majority of them have virtually no background on the subject matter of Russian affairs."
Ukraine will win as surely as Bongbong Marcos will be our next president
March 15, 2022 by zaxx
"Whereas other candidates offer comfort, survival, and freebees, Bongbong Marcos symbolizes the highest aspirations of Filipinos – that one day we would not be looked down as losers anymore among the league of nations."