A survey by the Social Weather Stations discovered that 75 percent or three out of four Filipinos or of those polled were in favor of ABS-CBN’s franchise renewal, and over half of them believed that non-renewal of the media giant a major blow to press freedom.
The survey was taken from July 3-6 in the midst of several hearings in the House of Representatives regarding the renewal of the franchise.
Prior to the Congress denying the application of ABS-CBN, the poll also found that 13 percent disagreed with a franchise renewal with 10 percent undecided.
Geographically, the proportion of those who called on Congress to renew the ABS-CBN franchise was highest in Mindanao at 80 percent, followed by the Visayas at 77 percent, Luzon at 74 percent, and Metro Manila at 69 percent.
It was higher in rural areas at 81 percent than in urban areas at 70 percent. ABS-CBN served several rural areas, and most of them only get their news and entertainment from the broadcasting giant.
The SWS July 3-6, 2020 National Mobile Phone Survey was a probability-based survey that used mobile phone and computer-assisted telephone interviews of 1,555 adult Filipinos nationwide. The survey had sampling error margins of ±2 percent for national percentages; ±6 percent for Metro Manila; and ±5 percent for Balance Luzon, the Visayas, and Mindanao.
