I wrote about Senator Noynoy Aquino’s plans for Mindanao the other day, and at the risk of sounding like I’m campaigning for him, I’d like to continue with the other things he said in last Friday’s early morning press conference here in Davao City. And since it is the campaign period, let me start with something interesting he mentioned: that 70 percent of a campaign is about “imaging,” that is, “in the absence of knowledge of a candidate, people will base their view of him on the image he projects.” Unfortunately, imaging can also be used against a candidate: people can also base their view of him on the image projected of him by his opponents.
I’m not sure where he got his figure of 70 percent (probably from his days as retail sales supervisor and youth promotions assistant for Nike Philippines), but it does seem about right. After all, candidates do practically anything for name recall, and they also do anything to destroy their opponents in the public eye. Black propaganda, the latter is called, and Aquino claimed to have been subjected to a lot of this ever since he announced his candidacy in September last year.
Unfortunately, work at the Senate (and a good work ethic) has prevented him from defending himself fully from the attacks, so somehow a lot of the rumors about Aquino seem to have stuck. One of the most vicious and pervasive is the insinuation that he is — or was — autistic. I’ll write about this topic in a later column, but suffice it to say that as the uncle of two autistic children, I was deeply offended that some people actually used this condition to try and bring down a political opponent.
On the other side of the coin is that Aquino believes his closest rival, Senator Manny Villar, is doing nothing but propping himself up through his incessant advertisements. People, he said, are basing their view of the man on the ads, which really show nothing more than the telegenic side of the billionaire senator. That Villar has gained on him over the past four months is testament to the power of the media to influence people’s perceptions, and it is something he intends to use to his advantage now that the official campaign period has started.
“I am not surprised with the turn of events,” Aquino said. “Our opponent had a long head start in this campaign. I have been doing my work at the Senate and have been on the road only on weekends. My opponent, on the other hand, has been campaigning full time. And for all the unprecedented and sustained ads spending and increasingly below-the-belt and baseless propaganda, I am surprised that I am still on top of the surveys.”
And with the Senate sessions now over, and as the campaign period begins, he can now go “full blast.” “You’ll see a change in the numbers,” he said.
(Photo credit: Bing Gonzales)
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