Philippine Daily Inquirer/Opinion/by Ma. Ceres P. Doyo
EVEN BEFORE THE OFFICIAL CAMPAIGN PERIOD began on Feb. 9, six of the 10 presidential candidates have already spent some P1 billion on political ads. But the real advertising value of all those ads could actually amount to about P2.1 billion.
The Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) released Wednesday its latest report, “War on the air waves: 6 top bets spend P1-B on pol ads,” by senior researcher-writer Che de los Reyes. This is part of PCIJ’s series of reports for the project “Pera at Politika (PAP) 2010.”
PCIJ’s two-part report reveals that in the last three months before the election campaign period began, 6 of the 10 candidates for president had already “racked up advertising values on television, radio and print media worth a whopping P2.1 billion.”
But minus the discounts and commissions that, according to media networks executives and PRs, reach about 50 percent, the real spending of the six candidates would be about P991 million from Nov. 1, 2009 to Jan. 30, 2010. Or close to P1 billion. These so-called “negotiated rates” are still a staggering amount. The spending on political ads after Feb. 9 is another story.
Even more interesting, PCIJ points out, is that five of the six candidates have “by now exceeded the limit on TV airtime minutes, if these pre-campaign ads were measured against the Fair Election Practices Act or Republic Act No. 9006.” Will these candidates who have defied the law and overspent be penalized?
Well, they could get away with their overspending by saying that those ads fall under “advocacy ads” or whatever. Think of all those pre-campaign period “advocacy ads” that made some of the candidates for president, and candidates for other positions as well, look like they were God’s special gift to this world.
For her report, De los Reyes reviewed the AGB Nielsen Media Research ad spending data base. According to PCIJ executive director Malou Mangahas, PCIJ manages the subscription to the data base on behalf of its PAP 2010 partner organizations, namely, Lawyers’ League for Liberty, Center for Electoral Reforms and the Association of Schools of Public Administration in the Philippines.
Let’s go back to the P2.1 billion figure (advertising value). About half of this, the PCIJ report says, represents the ad buys of Nacionalista Party standard-bearer Sen. Manuel Villar. PCIJ points out that a presidential candidate’s maximum campaign spending limit is only P500 million or P10 per voter. PCIJ adds that Villar’s party may however spend another P5 per voter or P250 million.
PCIJ tells us that “Villar’s TV ads also logged a total airtime of 758.5 minutes on GMA channel 7, and 696 minutes on ABS-CBN Channel 2 during those three months before the campaign period. Four other presidential candidates racked up formidable totals for their respective TV ads on the two stations as well, most of them posting total airtime for the placements at both GMA and ABS-CBN in the three digits.”
Here is the ad duration in minutes of the other candidates (from Nov. 1 2009-Jan. 31, 2010): Benigno Aquino III (218.77 ABS-CBN, 136.75 GMA), Joseph Estrada (96 ABS-CBN, 44.5 GMA), Richard Gordon (248 ABS-CBN, 127.5 GMA), Gilberto Teodoro Jr. (291.75 ABS-CBN, 257.75 GMA), Eddie Villanueva (24.5 ABS-CBN, 161.75 GMA), and Manuel Villar Jr. (696 ABS-CBN, 758.5 GMA). PCIJ adds that Villanueva who has equity interest in QTV 11, a joint venture of his Zoe Broadcasting Network with GMA, recorded an additional 221.5 minutes of ad buys on QTV 11.
It is obvious that candidates took the opportunity to splurge to campaign during the pre-campaign period in order for them to avoid the spending limits of the campaign period. PCIJ says, these candidates took advantage of the amended Election Modernization Act that says, one is considered a candidate only “at the start of the campaign period for which he filed his certificate of candidacy.”
They could also invoke the Supreme Court’s Nov. 2009 ruling that says that a candidate’s political acts become unlawful only when the campaign period starts.
Here are the ad values that PCIJ took from AGB Nielsen data and computed based on rate cards. TV ad values were reduced by 50 percent to arrive at the indicative real ad cost.
The ad war is more intense than the ground war, PCIJ tells us. The moneyed Villar is ahead of the pack when it comes to total ad value. (See table in http://www.pcij.org)
There is more to the PCIJ report than the figures (See PCIJ website.) Media and ad executives who crunch numbers also tell us what all these mean and amount to. By understanding all these, voters can discern better and will not be overwhelmed and bulldozed by these ads that don’t really tell us the whole truth.
Take them as entertainment. Or just reach for that remote.
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