73% of Filipinos okay national ID – SWS

More than 7 out of 10 Filipinos support having a national ID system, a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey showed.

A day after President Rodrigo Duterte signed the law enacting the Philippine System Identification Act (PhilSys Act) on August 6, the SWS said 73 percent of Filipinos supported the proposal of a single ID that may replace the different identification cards that they use.

The survey ran from June 27 to 30, 2018, after Congress ratified the then still proposed PhilSys Act.

The SWS study showed that about 46 percent of the 1,200 individuals surveyed nationwide said they “strongly agree” with a national ID while 27 percent said they “agree” with it.

Meanwhile, 18 percent said they “disapprove” and nine percent admitted that they did not know the issue.

Those who agree minus those who disagree show a +55 net approval score, which the SWS said showed an “Extremely Strong” support for the system.

The highest percentage of support came from Metro Manila with +60, Balance Luzon at +58, the Visayas at +53, and Mindanao at +48.

Survey results showed 32 percent of Filipinos seeing a national ID system as a “very big help,” 28 percent a “big help,” 26 percent giving “moderate help,” and 8 percent saying it is of “little help.”

The remaining 5 percent said that it will bring “almost no help at all” to their lives.

A total of 60 percent of respondents said that they trust the government to protect their private information contained in the national ID.

About 8 percent of the 1,200 individuals who took the survey said they did not trust the government while 30 percent remained “undecided.”

It had a margin of error of ±3 percent for national percentages and ±6 percent each for Metro Manila, Balance Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao. /cbb