Vice President Jejomar Binay on Thursday said the dip in his ratings in various presidential preference surveys was a “natural consequence” of declaring his presidential plans early.
“I started to be high in the ratings and later on bumaba nang bumaba. That’s a natural consequence kasi maaga akong nagsabi [na tatakbo bilang pangulo],” Binay said in an interview with CNN Philippines.
Binay, the erstwhile frontrunner in preference polls, announced his presidential bid under the United Nationalist Alliance and declared himself as opposition leader after he resigned from the Aquino cabinet.
Sen. Grace Poe was still the most preferred presidential aspirant of voters according to the latest Social Weather Stations and Pulse Asia surveys, but administration bet Manuel “Mar Roxas” II snatched the second spot from Binay, who slipped to third place in terms of percentage points.
Binay’s trust and approval ratings also dropped by 18 and 15 points respectively during the third quarter of 2015, according to Pulse Asia.
READ: Poe keeps lead in SWS survey; Roxas leaps over Binay | Poe keeps lead, Roxas rises in latest Pulse Asia survey | Binay suffers sharp trust, approval ratings dip—Pulse Asia poll
But the Vice President admitted that corruption allegations being hurled against him affected survey results and public perception.
Binay also attributed the decrease in his ratings to a supposed “demolition by perception” allegedly being carried out by political opponents to sabotage his presidential bid.
“These are not ended issues. Ended in a sense that there’s no intervention on the part of the court saying that you’re guilty or not. This is what I call demolition by perception. What am I doing against all these lies? I’ve been talking straight to people. It’s unfortunate na hindi ako maka-ano sa media. So, I started going to the provinces and explaining to the people,” he said. Yuji Vincent Gonzales
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