3 of 5 Pinoys says more responsibility rests on nat’l gov’t in solving COVID-19 mess

MANILA, Philippines — Three in five Filipinos believe that the national government has more responsibility in solving the COVID-19 crisis compared to local government units (LGUs), a recent survey revealed.

Results from a Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey from July 3 to 6 showed that 60 percent of their 1,555 adult-age respondents said that the national government should shoulder most of the load in fixing the problems created by the pandemic.

“The special [SWS] July 2020 National Mobile Phone Survey found that three out of five (60%) adult Filipinos say the national government, rather than the local government, is more responsible for solving the COVID-19 crisis,” SWS said in a report dated Monday.

Another 23 percent said that the local government should be more responsible in solving the health crisis, while 14 percent believed that both branches are equally responsible.

SWS noted that they conducted the survey through mobile phone and computer-assisted interviews, asking respondents the questions “Sa inyong palagay, sino sa dalawang ito ang mas may responsibilidad sa paglutas sa krisis ng Covid-19? Ito po ba ay ang gobyernong nasyonal na pinamumunuan ng Pangulo, o mga gobyernong lokal na pinamumunuan ng mga gobernador at mayor?”

(In your opinion, which of the two do you think is more responsible for solving the Covid-19 crisis? Is this the national government headed by the President, or the local government headed by the governors and mayors?)

SWS found out that this mindset — placing a larger responsibility on the national government — decreases among those who have higher educational attainment.

Ironically, the survey results showed that belief in higher responsibility for the national government was 66 percent among elementary graduates, 63 percent among non-elementary graduates, 61 percent among junior high school students, 58 percent among college undergraduates, and 53 percent among those who finished college.

The belief that the national government should be more responsible is almost equal among survey localities, with 61 percent in Metro Manila and 60 percent apiece for Balance Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao.  People in both urban and rural areas also share the same opinion.

Recently, a Philippine College of Physicians (PCP) official made a remark praising the Department of Health (DOH) efforts to curb the COVID-19 infections, and then speculating that problems in implementation may have been on the side of LGUs.

“Actually maski noong umpisa pa lang nakita ho namin na nasa tamang direksyon naman po kayo [DOH], except siguro hindi po nai-implement sa mga local government units, so importante po siguro dito, importanteng manawagan ho tayo,” PCP vice president Maria Encarnita Limpin said.

(Actually even during the start of the pandemic, we saw that you are already in the right direction, except maybe that policies are not being implemented in various local government units, so maybe it is also important for us to make a call.)

SWS said that the 1,555 respondents are subdivided into the four locales, in proportion to population predictions by the Philippine Statistics Authority — 306 respondents from Metro Manila, 451 from Balance Luzon 388 in the Visayas, and 410 in Mindanao.

The research firm said that they are maintaining sampling error margins of ±2% for national percentages, ±6% for Metro Manila, and ±5% for Balance Luzon, ±5% for the Visayas, and ±5% for Mindanao. [ac]