By Floreen Simon and Malou Mangahas
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
EVEN WITH just part of their campaign spending captured by Nielsen Media’s monitoring of their political ads from Feb. 9 to the end of March, at least two presidential and two senatorial candidates have already breached half of the cap set by the Commission on Elections (Comelec).
Interestingly, too, many candidates for national posts apparently went on a campaign-spending frenzy immediately before the Comelec meter began ticking, resulting in nearly P800 million worth of ad placements within a mere eight days.
By all indications, the unbridled spending spree on political ads alone by the national candidates is turning the next fortnight’s balloting into the costliest yet in Philippine electoral history.
The official 90-day campaign period for national candidates began on Feb. 9. The campaign-spending limits set by Comelec — P10 per registered voter for presidential and vice presidential posts; P5 per registered voter for independent senatorial candidates, as well as for political parties and party-list organizations; and P3 per registered voter for Senate bets from political parties — are in effect only during this period.
Comelec records show that as of last Jan. 7, the country has a total of 54,363,844 registered voters. This means that for the May 9 polls, the campaign-spending limit for presidential and vice presidential aspirants is P543,638,440 per candidate; P271,819,220 for independent senatorial candidates, political parties, and party-list organizations; and P163,091,532 for senatorial candidates fielded by political parties.
PCIJ has subscribed to Nielsen Media’s monitoring reports on campaign spending. Nielsen’s latest report covered the first 50 days of the official campaign and is based on the published rate cards for TV, radio, print, and outdoor ad placements.
Daily average: P54M
The “air war” typically accounts for up to 80 percent of the bill that national candidates must cover. But campaign spending also includes multiple collaterals for the “ground war,” such as the production of the candidates’ ad materials; the conduct of public rallies; campaign t-shirts and giveaways; communication, transportation, and meals for sorties; rental and equipment for campaign headquarters; printing of sample ballots; and compensation for counsel, media agents, campaign staff, and poll watchers.
Yet even with just the ad placements monitored by Nielsen, the candidates running for president, vice president, and the Senate, along with their political parties, had already spent some P2.7 billion from Feb. 9 to Mar. 31, 2016 alone.
That comes up to an average of P54 million in ad spend every day, or P2.25 million in ad spend every hour, by the candidates to national posts, in the first 50 days of the 90-day campaign period. The daily ad spend of these candidates could yield P502,441 in daily cash bonanza for every Filipino, if distributed among the nation’s population of 102 million.
Yet that’s not the only ad spending that has been happening. Last month, PCIJ reported that according to Nielsen Media’s monitoring, most of the same candidates had spent about P6.7 billion in pre-campaign ads that featured them as “advertiser” or “product” in about 105,00 ad spots on TV, radio, and print media, from March 2015 to Jan. 31, 2016. Adding the P800 million in additional ad spend from last Feb. 1 to 8, the pre-campaign ad spend by these candidates amount to P7.5 billion in all.
Altogether, ad placements by national candidates in the upcoming elections, as captured by Nielsen, have.
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