SWS: Corona rating plunges

MANILA, Philippines—Amid allegations that he had been partial to the interests of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, embattled Chief Justice Renato Corona posted a “poor” net satisfaction rating that plunged 14 points from the previous quarter, according to a recent survey of the Social Weather Stations.

Results of the Fourth Quarter 2011 Social Weather Survey, first published in the BusinessWorld, showed that from a zero net satisfaction in September, Corona’s rating dropped to minus 14, with 21 percent of respondents saying they were satisfied with his performance and 35 percent saying otherwise.

Since his controversial appointment as Chief Justice in May 2010, Corona’s net satisfaction rating has not breached positive territory in earlier SWS surveys. Corona got his lowest rating of minus 18 in June 2010, while his highest net rating so far is zero, which he got in June and September last year.

The latest survey, which made use of face-to-face interviews with 1,200 adults nationwide, was conducted from Dec. 3 to 7, when President Aquino was assailing several decisions by the court, including one that allowed Arroyo to travel abroad which the Department of Justice at any rate defied.

Arroyo, now a Pampanga representative, is currently detained at Veterans Memorial Medical Center on charges of electoral sabotage.

Corona was impeached by 188 House members on Dec. 12, and stands accused of betrayal of public trust, graft and corruption and culpable violation of the Constitution. His trial is to begin on Jan. 16. Lawrence de Guzman, Inquirer Research