A STUDY conducted by the Ateneo Statistics Circle (A-Stat Ateneo) showed that Ateneans have a -44% net trust rating for President Rodrigo Duterte. It also showed that most Ateneans are more likely to support the President in the following days of his administration, but show little trust for other government bodies, with the exception of Vice President Leni Robredo who garnered a trust rating of 44%.

The survey, #100 Days A study on the Atenean Perceptions of the Current Administration, was released November 1.

The study focused on the respondents’ evaluation of the President’s performance during his first 100 Days in office and the perception of his future performance. It also gathered trust ratings of other government bodies such as the Vice-President, the Cabinet, the Congress, the Supreme Court and the Senate.

Technicalities and findings

A-Stat made use of surveys, 207 of which were manually circulated on campus. Others were disseminated online through Facebook groups and other social media platforms. A total of 385 students answered the survey.

10% of the participants were freshmen, 43% were sophomores, 25% were juniors, 19% were seniors, and 3% were superseniors.

34% of these respondents were from the John Gokongwei School of Management, 11% were from the School of Humanities, 24% were from the School of Science and Engineering, and 31% were from the School of Social Sciences.

Meanwhile, 36% reported permanent residence in Luzon, 5% from Visayas, 4% from Mindanao, and 55% from the National Capital Region.

“We tried to take into account home region, because we wanted to see if people from say the NCR viewed the differently from the people from Mindanao,” said A-Stat Vice President for Research and Consultancy Javi Martinez.

The study also showed how Ateneans perceived Duterte’s policies on various issues in the country. The awareness of the respondents was taken into account in arriving at the results.

Respondents supported Peace Talks in Mindanao the most with an approval rating of 46%, where 79% reported awareness of the issue. This is followed by the Freedom of Information Bill and Labor Contractualization (18%), and Public Transportation (10%), where 75%, 71%, and 77% reported awareness of the issues respectively.

Despite the positive results on some stances, the respondents expressed disapproval on the President’s standpoint on Traffic [congestion] (-12%), Spratly Islands (-28%), Philippine Economy (-31%), Cabinet Appointments (-36%), Philippine-US Relations (-66%), Philippine-World Relations (-72%).

The burial of Ferdinand Marcos in the Libingan ng mga Bayani received the most disapproval, receiving a -80% approval rating, with 98% claiming awareness of the issue.

Duterte’s “War On Drugs,” his main promise during the campaign, received a rating of -31% where 98% reported awareness, while his stance on extrajudicial killings received -79% with an awareness of 100%.

The study did not include perceptions on recent events such as Duterte’s state visit to China, the aftermath of Typhoon Lawin, as well as the demonstrations at the United States embassy that ended in police brutality.

Other government bodies

Aside from the President’s performance, the study also highlighted the respondents’ stance towards the other government bodies.

Robredo was the sole official who received a positive net trust rating of 44%, while the rest garnered negative ratings.

The least trusted bodies following the President are Congress (-31%), the Senate (-28%), the Cabinet (-24%), and the Supreme Court (-4%).

According to Martinez, he presumed the ratings to be negative for the President, but he did not expect the same for other government bodies.

“I wasn’t shocked that everything seemed so negative,” he said. “However, I did not expect how distrustful we are of nearly all other government institutions from the Supreme Court to Congress.”

Implications

Ateneo Assembly Associate Vice President for Research and Analysis Jayvee del Rosario said that the Atenean’s perception of the current administration’s first 100 days relies on their internalization of the “Jesuits’ value for the inalienable right to life.”

“His criminals-must-be-killed rhetoric has permeated his administration too deeply that when you think of Duterte, you think of EJKs, and that will put off most Ateneans,” he said.

However, he also recognized the positive policies enacted by the new administration that are supported by Ateneans. “Some of these include his attempts at making peace with communist and Moro insurgents, and his creation of a presidential task force for the protection of the media,” he said.

The study’s conclusion stated an “incongruence between the Atenean population and the Filipino on average,” citing how the president gained high approval rates from the nation yet received low marks from the Ateneo sample.

“We also see a disconnect from the sample, noting how different they are from the average Filipino. Duterte’s trust ratings in public as around 70%, for our sample of Ateneans it’s at -44%,” said Martinez.

He reiterated that the results cannot be generalized since the sample did not satisfy the quotas needed for stratification. However, he thinks the results still confirm the preconceived notion that Ateneans do not like Duterte and the current administration.

He said that Ateneans expect the worst from this administration, and he argues that students should not only be critical, but positive as well.

“We come off as quite pessimistic…we’ve had bad presidents before, and we will have them in the future. We’ll get through this,” he said.

When asked if he thinks Ateneans’ trust and support for the new administration will rise over time, del Rosario said it will depend on the administration’s future actions.

“If Duterte continues to promote EJKs, which Jesuit formation is fiercely against, then I think it will continue to fall; however, if Duterte shifts his paradigm of handling criminality from elimination to rehabilitation, then more Ateneans may start supporting him,” he added.