Estrada strengthens lead in RP presidential race

Estrada strengthens lead in RP presidential race

MANILA (Agencies): Vice President Joseph Estrada, the main opposition candidate in next week's presidential elections in the Philippines, has solidified his lead, according to a survey published yesterday.

Estrada received a support rating of 33 percent, 18 points ahead of his closest rival, ruling party candidate Jose de Venecia, the Social Weather Stations (SWS) survey organization said.

Estrada has dominated the field of 11 presidential aspirants in all five surveys conducted by the widely-respected polling group since January. A former movie star and college dropout, he has admitted to womanizing, heavy drinking and gambling in the past.

An SWS survey last week gave Estrada a 32 percent rating. Despite his apparent popular support, some business groups worry that Estrada does not have the ability to lead the country's economy to continued strong growth.

Estrada and his running mate, Edgardo Angara, visited the Manila Stock Exchange yesterday to seek support from the business community.

At the exchange, Estrada met stockbrokers who in a recent Reuters survey put him almost at the bottom of their list of presidential favorites, wary of his lack of economic background.

"You have nothing to fear from an Estrada presidency, which is sure to come," Angara said.

"We must be partners for progress," Estrada told the traders in a brief speech.

Estrada tried to calm a nervous business community and named a top banker to lead his economic team yesterday.

Ruling party candidate De Venecia received 15 percent support in the SWS survey, published in the Manila Standard newspaper.

De Venecia has served as House speaker and has a reputation as a wheeler-dealer. But he has been credited with mustering congressional support for President Fidel Ramos's economic reform agenda.

Sharing third place with 11 percent each were Senator Raul Roco and businessman Emilio Osmena. Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim, who is backed by former President Corazon Aquino, placed fifth with 10 percent and former Defense Secretary Renato de Villa was sixth with 6 percent.

The ruling party vice presidential candidate, Senator Gloria Arroyo, received 42 percent support, far ahead of Angara's 18 percent. Presidents and vice presidents are elected separately and need not be from the same party.

Ramos is limited by the Philippine constitution to a single, six-year term and will step down June 30. The election to replace him is scheduled for next Monday.

A bloody incident marred the peaceful campaign yesterday when a drunken militiaman shot dead three people during a rally and escaped as the crowd broke into a stampede.

A pregnant woman was killed by a stray round when gunmen sprayed bullets at a mayoral candidate.

Fifteen men surrounded the house of a mayor and shot him dead in his kitchen while he ate breakfast; two neighbors were shot down when they rushed from their homes after hearing gunfire.

It's election time in the Philippines and the bodies are piling up.

Such violence is par for the course, but compared with the last presidential election in 1992, the congressional polls of 1995, and certainly the gun-slinging "wild east" days of the 1950s and 60s, the current campaign has been comparatively peaceful.