Philippines Presidential Race Tightening: PollAFP - Monday, February 1Villar gains momentum Presidential hopeful Benigno Aquino III loses more points to rival Manny Villar as elections draw near.
MANILA (AFP) - – Philippine presidential candidate Benigno Aquino's once-vast lead in the opinion polls has shrunk to just a few points, according to a survey published Monday, a week before the start of campaigning.
Aquino, who had been predicted to take 60 percent of the vote in polls published when he first filed his candidacy for the May election, has seen his comfortable lead dry up as rival Manuel Villar gains momentum.
Aquino was the preferred choice of 42 percent in the January 21-24 Social Weather Stations survey commissioned by Business World Newspaper, down two points from late December 2009 and off four points from a month earlier.
Multi-millionaire Villar, like Aquino a senator, gained three points from late December to 35 percent, and eight points from a month earlier, the newspaper reported.
The nationwide poll of 2,100 people had a margin of error of plus or minus two percentage points.
Deposed former president Joseph Estrada, jailed for life then pardoned after being convicted of corruption in 2007, remained in distant third place in the 10-candidate race, dropping two points from late December to 13 percent.
Aquino, 51, has risen to the top of the polls on a popular outpouring of sympathy following the death last year of his mother, democracy icon and former president Corazon Aquino.
Business World did not give a reason for the tightening of the race. Social Weather officials could not be reached for comment Monday.