“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently” - Warren Buffett, an American investor, business tycoon, and philanthropist.
Warren Buffet’s words should be significant to our political leaders, particularly those eyeing next year’s elections.
In today’s issue, we continue on the topic: next year’s presidential election.
Expectedly, prospective candidates and their political parties will be working on image building and reputation management in the run-up to May 2022.
With the next presidential election only a year away, the air is rife with talks about the contenders. Prospective aspirants for President, Vice-President, Senators, and so on down the line are already jockeying for position.
What the voter thinks about the candidate matters most in an election.
Collins Dictionary of Sociology defines political image as the positive or negative conceptions of its policies, programs, and leaders which a political party has established within an electorate.
Views on political image vary. In an article in Review of Communication, Dan Schill said that visual images play a central role in constructing political images.
Another scholar of image-building, Ashley Dugger, believes that public image is the character projected to the public, especially as interpreted by the mass media.
He also thinks that impressions play an essential role in the campaign. The candidates take on a particular character or persona during the election season, lasting up to two years.
Experts on this subject contend that Presidents and presidential candidates want to display both “the visual image and the personality that best resonates with the public”.
Often, simple likability matters much more than a candidate's political attitude. They point out how the image-builders of former US President Barack Obama portrayed him as an authentic symbol for change, heading in a different direction and ushering in a new era where an African American man could be president.
The news items mentioned below point to some political images which are currently in the limelight. One of these is Social Weather Station’s finding that the majority of Filipinos think it is dangerous to publish critical statements about the administration of President Rodrigo Duterte.
It said 65 percent of the respondents agreed it was dangerous to publish or broadcast anything critical of the administration, even if it is the truth.
The survey from November 21 to 25 among 1,500 adults nationwide is not necessarily flattering since it is an image that strikes fear among Filipinos. But note what follows. Moreover, the 65 percent could unleash their true sentiments through the secret ballot.
A related finding comes from the Pulse Asia survey. In that one, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio, got the top position in terms of the people’s preference for the 2022 presidential elections if elections were held on the day they were interviewed.
Mong Palatino of The Diplomat, a premier international current-affairs magazine for the Asia-Pacific region, states that “the high approval rating for September (2020) should not make the Duterte government complacent.
Former President Joseph Estrada also enjoyed overwhelming public support but was still ousted from power following a corruption scandal.
He goes on to say that "the survey results do not absolve the government from accountability regarding the worsening human rights situation, corruption and the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. Its refusal to acknowledge these problems could only cause more disruption and division in society”.
The high trust rating should not blind it since the crucial test of Duterte's popularity will come when Filipinos go to the polls for the next presidential elections in 2022, he concludes.
In the same tone, David Camroux from the Center for Studies on International Relations based in France – in this article “COVID-19 and Strongman Rule in the Philippines” states that online rage at the incompetence of the Duterte Administration is drowning out his propaganda machine and his team of trolls.
The surveys are more reliable than a researcher's observation. But it shows that there are many ways of looking at the present situation. The political image we see has many faces. What will it be in May 2022?
Here is a food-for-thought to politicians:
It takes many good deeds to build a good reputation, and only one bad one to lose it. Benjamin Franklin