2022 PHILIPPINE ELECTION: MANILA, Philippines — UK think tank: Marcos win in 2022 a ‘risk’ to PH recovery, investment

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MANILA, Philippines — United Kingdom-based think tank Pantheon Macroeconomics considers a win of leading presidential aspirant Ferdinand “Bongbong” Marcos Jr. in the May 2022 elections as a risk to the Philippines’ economic and investment recovery from its pandemic-induced slump.

“Elections in the Philippines are rarely fought on economic policy. But they still carry significant event risk, particularly if Ferdinand Marcos Jr., the current frontrunner and the son of an ex-dictator, wins. His father was toppled by the last major revolution, in 1986,” Pantheon Macroeconomics senior Asia economist Miguel Chanco said in a report.

In particular, Chanco said next year’s national polls would keep investors on wait-and-see.

It would not help that the prolonged COVID-19 pandemic would also temper consumer spending, Chanco added.

“Consumption is likely to remain tepid, at best, as households continue to rebuild the massive savings lost since the pandemic started, a process set back markedly by Delta,” he said, referring to the more contagious COVID-19 strain which reverted parts of the country to the most stringent lockdowns last August.

As such, unlike most other economic think tanks and financial institutions which forecasted the Philippines’ gross domestic product (GDP) to grow faster in 2022 than this year, Chanco said “the Philippines is the only economy [in emerging Asia] where we expect to see growth slow next year.”