Margaritagate and The Danish Debacle

A while back journalist and lawyer (everyone's a lawyer in this country...I think this is because it is the easiest way to be entitled Doctor, since having a master's degree in law gives you the title Dr. in this country), Marcos Martínez of Santiago (the second city, the capital of the Cibao valley and heart, lungs and economic motor of the country), in his morning show on Channel 55 accused the First Lady, and current vice-presidential candidate for the PLD, Margarita Cedeño and senator Félix Bautista, the allegedly and proven corrupt, senator of the PLD for San Juan, of having bank accounts in Den Danske Bank (The Danish Bank, major bank in Denmark) with holdings of 43.8 million €. Martínez argued he had evidence to prove this, but did not produce in the show at that time. Later, however, he did produce the so-called evidence, and it became relatively obvious for any serious person that the accusations were a lie.

Anyway I became rather curious about this. Knowing that all politicians tend to get rich when in power in the DR, I would not be surpised that Fernández/Cedeño family has values of that kind, and we do know Félix Bautista has that kind of money (see one of my previous blogs). Furthermore, it was a Danish connection, and coming from Norway, this was almost like home for me. My gut reaction, however, was that the accusations could not be true. If Denmark is like Norway, you probably couldn't open a private account there without a national identity number, and, more importantly, if you are from the Caribbean and have 40 million € to hide, would you pick Denmark over let's say the Cayman Islands?

The whole story tells us something about the media in the DR, both the fringe, unserious media, represented by Marcos Martínez, and the mainstream media which is paralysed by its self-censorship (a fact that is much more evident in the Félix Bautista case than in this case, and in a host of other cases of scandals involving important people). Furthermore it gives insight into differences in political culture between Scandinavia and the DR, and teaches us the value of having a professional, autonomous and politically independent bureaucracy (even though we might dislike bureaucracy in Scandinavia as well, some time in the DR or other places like the DR, teaches you the value of rules and regulations that are upheld by the state).

Let me quickly first take up the story again. First, in February 2012 Martínez accuses the first lady and current vice-presidential candidate for owning a bank account with more than 40 million € in Den Danske Bank. Martínez had no evidence, but said he had evidence securely stored and would present them at a later date (first sign that this is a lie). Then, what struck me was that no serious newspaper or media picked up on this (that means they thought this could be true). Canal 55 and Martínez's show is a far way off mainstream media and any impact on the daily political agenda. Nevertheless, such an accusation, true or false, would have been great news-stuff in most other countries. In what seems to be a pattern, however, the main news-media only pick up critical stories of people close to power (the presidency, senators, ministers) when the accused denies the story. By denying the scandal, the accused has confirmed the accusation exists and it is ok for regular media to cover the story (the coverage, however, is generally that the negation of the accusation gets great coverage, while the accusation and potential evidence, do not). So when Margarita denied the accusations on twitter, if I remember correctly, and then stated that she would sue him for diffamation and what have you, the case exploded in the mainstream media (as a contrast the Félixgate, which actually seems true and involved high-end corruption in DR and Haiti, still receives little news coverage), and became dubbed the Margaritagate.

Sadly, and typically, the media and politicians here were more interested in the accusations and refutations among the politicians than finding out whether the whole thing was true. The Prosecutor General for instance should have been very interested in this. If it were true, then he could probably accuse the First Lady of tax evasion, corruption and what have you (in the USA this Prosecutor/Attorney General would have made a career on this, not so in the DR). If it were false, then he could run a case against the journalist for lies, defamation, etc. In the end the prosecutor general was not interested in doing anything (maybe out of fear that the accusations were true?). Therefore, I took matters into my own hands and contacted and tipped off two respectable Danish newspapers, one of which was interested and took the case. This was Berlingske Tidende which wrote this article on the matter. Apparently at the time via Facebook, Dominicans had sent messages to Den Danske Bank asking for information about the First lady's supposed account, but gotten the answer that any account information was classified and could not be released. The Berlingske Tidende article basically said that Den Danske Bank could not release any information about their clients, and that the Financial Supervisory Authority of Denmark could not give any statement about this either.

On behalf of the First Lady, the President of the Dominican Superintendence of the Banks, Ng Cortiñas, however, had gotten in contact with his Danish colleague, who informally had said to his Dominican colleague that no such bank account existed. This information, which the Danish Financial Supervisory Authority had gotten from Den Danske Bank, had to be kept a secret since the Danish Bank and the Financial Supervisory Authority officially could not give out such information. As a favour to his Dominican peer, the Danish helped the First lady out. Here, however, is where the culture clash and difference between a professional and politicised bureaucracy create problems in Denmark and DR.
While the Danish boss of the FSA is a professional (economist, I presume), the Dominican President of the Superintendencia de Bancos is a politician. Now that Ng Cortiñas (the president of the Superintendencia de Bancos) had gotten confirmed that the First Lady did not have a bank account in Den Danske Bank, he immediately held a press conference stating that Mikkel Holle from FSA in Denmark had confirmed this. The problem occurred when Berlingske Tidende asked Mikkel Holle about this and he of course had to deny to ever have given out any information to his Dominican colleague (which if it were true, would have been illegal). The Danish FSA of course assumed that the information would be handled with discretion and not used politically. The danes probably expected that Ng Cortiñas would tell this to the prosecutor general and maybe the president.

The case had indeed become political at that time. Marcos Martínez who originally made the accusation, was a former member of the PRD and its 1980s splinter party the PRI, and the PLD (the First Lady's party) used this information to discredit Martínez. He did not need much discrediting, really, because after some time he presented the following picture from a supposed internet bank account as evidence for the First Lady's and Félix Bautista's supposed accounts (on YouTube you can find several analyses of why these are false).

PRD followers, on the other hand, took the pictures to be real evidence and were even more strongly convinced that Margarita indeed had this account together with her brother Alberto Cedeño and the "crook" Félix Bautista. Furthermore, as news of the Berlingske Tidende news story came to the DR (it helped that BT translated the story into English), the PRD had reason to question Ng Cortiñas's story where he stated that his Danish colleagues had cleaned the First Lady's name. Now, with evidence from Denmark the PRD could say that what Ng Cortiñas told during the press conference was a lie. So the culture clash between the Dominican and Danish Bank superintendents also came back to haunt the Dominican government. Mikkel Holle, who Ng Cortiñas said he had spoken to, said he was surprised to be quoted in Dominican newspapers. In this case the Dominican Bank supervisor had fooled his Danish counterpart in order to score political points, but in the end he ended up raising more doubts about the First Lady. According to what I know from my sources, the conversation, or exchange of information between Denmark and the DR did actually take place, and it was confirmed that the First Lady does not have a bank account in Den Danske Bank (and of course, the evidence presented is false).

I was quoted in Berlingske Tidende that the opposition would believe this story, and that the PLD supporters would not believe this story, no matter the evidence. Even though in the previous blog I stated that during these electoral times one cannot trust surveys, I will here present an interesting graph demonstrating to which degree people now believe the First Lady actually has a bank account in Denmark. This survey was done by Greenberg on behalf of the newspaper Diario Libre (if anything, this survey was probably tilted in favour of the PRD), and more or less confirm my comment to BT.

Source: Diario Libre, Tuesday April 3. 
The columns show whether people think the accusations were true (Verdadero) false (Falso) or whether they do not know, or do not want to answer (No sabe/se rehúsa), and separate the answer according to which party the respondents will vote for on May 20. Only 8% of the PLD supporters believe the accusations to be true, while 55% of the PRD supporters have the same faith (33% in total population). Interestingly a full 21% of the PRD supporters believe them to be false, and also a 24% do not answer or do not know. The survey at least demonstrates that if accusations against your own party comes from the opposition, you will not trust them, and if the accusations come from your own against the other party, you are likely to trust them, but not blindly. There is therefore clearly a divide between the parties here, and it might lead us to speculate whether the revelations of so-called scandals may have any effect on the vote on May 20. Clearly in this case the evidence were really poor, but a better test might be the case of Félix Bautista and his corruption schemes which are well-documented (but silenced in the media). Will people from the PLD believe these accusations? If so, will that have any effect on their inclination to switch and vote for the PRD? The answer to the latter also depends on the likeability of the PRD candidate (which is not very high). Given the tightness of the DR election, even false scandals like this may have the sufficient effect to sway the election one way or the other, but I think the number of scandals that now pop up just is overkill and make the scandals lose any effect they might have...

Another problem with such false scandals and accusations is that they for one take away attention from the real scandals (the government is right now smoke-screening the Félix Bautista scandal inventing that a close associate and proven corrupted dirt-bag, of Hipólito Mejía may be complotting to remove President Martelly in Haiti), and false scandals make the real scandals less reliable.

Therefore it is important to know how you recognize a real scandal from a false one here in the DR, here are some ground rules:

1) False announcements of scandals are never accompanied with evidence right away. More often than not, the announcer would say that evidence is hidden to protect the announcer, and threaten to reveal the evidence any moment. Real scandals are presented with evidence right away, and almost always unequivocal evidence.

2) False announcements of scandals often come from political parties or people alligned with political parties, and regards the opposing party. Real scandals are almost always presented by Nuria Piera (and occassionally local journalists, Alicia Ortega or Acento.com.do)

3) False announcements of scandals generally get more attention in the media than real scandals. If they are against the government there is no risk in publishing them since they are false. If they are against the opposition the more attention the scandal is given the more damage it may make. Real scandals are never given much attention in mainstream media such as El Caribe, Hoy, Listín Diario until the denial is out and then only the denials are given attention.

4) False announcements of scandals are more often than not met with reactions that the scandalised victim will sue the announcer for defamation. There is no risk for the scandalised victim to go to court. If the accusations were true, evidence might get out, so a day in court is to be avoided at all costs. Real scandals are met with silence and denial, no one is sued.

The Martínez case is for now, getting to an end. Martínez has been summoned to court and has met the prosecutor in Santiago for interrogation on the matter. He still holds his information to be true (who wouldn't in this part of the world, admitting a lie or that you were wrong would clearly be against the "Claro!" culture nicely described by Diego Gambetta some years back), and Martínez even put out more evidence that the First Lady had made illegal payments to suppliers here in the DR as well. Martínez's morning show was also closed down last week. Explanations for the reason why, differ according to which party you belong to. The Canal 55 owners say it is because Martínez failed to show up for a couple of shows (which Martínez explains with being "held hostage" in his own home due to the police watching/surrounding his house making it impossible for him go get out). Martínez, however, argues that his show was closed down due to political pressure from the PLD. As always there are two versions here in the DR: the official version and the anti-government version. And, as always, no one is really interested in finding out which is closest to the truth.

Martínez will get his day in court since he was sued by the First Lady. He might get sentenced, probably just fined, we'll see, but since this was clearly a blunt lie, it seems obvious that he will lose any case in court. Should, however, the PRD win the presidential elections on May 20, I will not be surprised if Martínez will be back as a journalist quite soon, or get a good job in the new government. Hipólito Mejía, for instance, said when he was in New York during Easter, that he believes Martínez's accusations to be true, which is not surprising coming from that guy. Mejía has a very interesting view and vision of reality, and has, just as President Leonel Fernández, no problems working with previously convicted persons. 

The War of the Surveys

Semana Santa is over, and the latest bulletin from COE (Centro de Operaciones de Emergencia) reports that 40 people died during Easter week this year (16 more than last year). The majority died in traffic accidents, and the majority of dead in traffic accidents are motor cyclists (probably without a helmet). The last day of Semana Santa also brought the first dead of this electoral campaign as fighting turned into gunshots between PLD and PRD supporters during campaigning in Moca. One PRD supporter died and a PLD activist was wounded. During the easter week the candidates had promised not to do any campaigning, so Mejía and Medina went to the USA to campaign there (since campaigning abroad was not mentioned in the Pacto de Civilidad the candidates signed a week before Easter). The major parties' activists, however, campaigned both on Thursday and on Easter Sunday, when traffic in and out of the cities was the highest, creating a lot of extra traffic jams and frustration among people.

Now that Easter is over, the quiet week turns into a noisy last 40 days of electoral campaigning. I am taking a lot of taxis in the capital these days, and most taxistas say that it doesn't matter who wins as long as there only is one round of elections (In fact a political cartoonist from El Día argued today that Jesus Christ's suffering only lasted the Long Friday, while the Dominican people's suffering would last until May 20, ie. election day). A particular feat of the campaigns in the DR is "la guerra de las encuestas", the war of the Surveys, and today I got to experience a little part of that when I went to a press conference organised by Benenson Strategy Group (see also Wikipedia) who wanted to publicise their latest survey. Before I get to that survey, let me briefly display this "war" between the top two candidates.

The bandwagon effect is well known among behaviouralists and within political science and electoral studies. The idea is that people feel better if they support the winner, and that makes some voters vote for the candidate that seems most likely to win the election (independent of what they think of this candidate). The opposite effect would be the underdog effect, but of the two, the bandwagon effect has gotten more attention and seems to be more solidly supported by evidence and studies. The parties in the DR must think that the bandwagon effect is particularly strong here, because both major candidates put great effort into publishing that the surveys put them on top and a sure winner in the first round. Therefore walking the streets of Santo Domingo you can see that part of Danilo Medina's strategy is basically to show that a majority supports him, see for instance this poster (even though the guy you see on the photo in the lower right corner, and his three other friends (not in the photo) playing domino on a street off the Malecón in Santo Domingo on Saturday April 7, all said they supported "Papá", ie. Hipólito Mejía).

Several places in the city you'll see the posters showing that either 52 or 56% prefers Danilo or thinks that Danilo will win the election. Both parties also pay for full page ads in the major newspapers. On Wednesday 4 of April, Danilo reports that all surveys show him as winner in the first round, referring to ASISA's survey of March 27 and 28 which as Medina as winner with 52.8% against Mejía's 45% (others 2.2%), and NEWLINK Research's survey from March 31-April 1, which has the Danilo/Margarita ticket(-s) as winner with 49.1% against Mejía/Abinader with 44%. Today, on April 9, however, Hipólitio Mejía and the PRD retaliated with a full page in El Día, El Nacional, and Hoy (and potentially other newspapers) stating "change is coming" and that the surveys confirm it. Even though Medina said that all surveys point to him as winner, Mejía could present at least four surveys that disagree with Medina. According to Mejía's ad, Bendixen and Amandi's survey from March 23-31 has Mejía as winner with 51.4% against Medina's 39.7%, JZ analytics (31 March) has 49% for Mejía, 44% for Medina, Ana María Acevedo (27-30 March) has Mejía/Abinader with 51.8% and Medina/Cedeño with 44.7%, and Greenberg-Diario Libre has Mejía with 49% and Medina with 46%. My summary of these surveys is just below, and an average of all these surveys (plus the Benenson Strategy group survey) puts Mejía just above Medina with 47.2 against 46.3% (but bear in mind that this includes four surveys used in Mejía adds, two used in Medina adds, and the Benenson survey, which for reasons I deal with below, I am sure will be used in Medina adds soon. This gives Mejía a 4-3 edge in surveys for this average calculation).

So why are the surveys so important? Well, there are reasons to believe that the Bandwagon effect should be strong in the DR, although I have never seen any evidence that substantiates this. First of all, the DR is a clientelistic society and state. Literally thousands of people are promised jobs by the candidates during the campaign, and the candidates will deliver as best as they can if they win office. If you belong to the winner you increase your chances tremendously of getting a "botella", i.e. a state-job won through clientelism, or being put on the nomina which puts you on the payroll without you having to work; and if you are with the loser you are guaranteed not to get either. If you can demonstrate that during the campaign you worked for the winner, you own a party membership card, and so on, you have a shot. The bandwagon effect could be important for everyone trying to decide the last few months and wants to become active in the campaign with the motive of winning a state job. Second, as mentioned in an earlier blog, there are virtually no ideological differences between the two main parties, which both started out on the left, but are now relatively conservative parties. The less ideology means in an election, the more likely it is that voters may be swayed by other motives, such as a bandwagon effect. Third, many do not want a second round and may vote for the likely winner according to the surveys just to avoid a round number 2 (there is a ballotage if no candidate gets 50%+1 vote in the first round), which is likely to enhance a bandwagon effect. 

Most of these surveys cannot be taken seriously, and I do not trust any of these now that election day is getting closer. Historically it is Hamilton and Gallup that have produced the most reliable surveys here, but I have not seen any of these doing surveys in March. In February Hamilton reported that Medina had 50% vs. Mejía's 45% (and given the margin of error that is a technical draw). The latest example of a non-trustworthy survey is the one from the respectable US firm Benenson Strategy group. This is a firm that does surveys, but mainly to be used to provide consults to politicians, find political solutions, etc. See their webpage: http://www.bsgco.com. Benenson reports that Juan Manuel Santos, Barack Obama, UK Labour Party and other prominent politicians are and have been their clients. They sell information to politicians and give politicians advice (a bit like accounting firms/consulting firms doing accounting and consulting for the same companies, recent US history demonstrates that this was a bad combination). So Benenson is a serious firm, but normally hired by politicians for (among other things) survey-based advice, which in the DR context makes them unreliable given that potentially the best advice Benenson could give a candidate is to demonstrate strength in surveys, and then produce this survey.

Anyway, today, April 9, at 10 am Benenson called for a press conference at the relatively new hotel Holiday Inn in the posh area of Lincoln Avenue (fun fact is that while Holiday Inn is a moderately priced hotel/motel in the USA, in the DR Holiday Inn is a luxury, business hotel which is more expensive than the luxurious Inter-Continental hotel in Santo Domingo that belongs to the same chain of hotels). As demonstrated in the graph above, Benenson could report 48% for Medina and 40% for Mejía when all candidates were included; asked about the ticket (but excluding other candidates) 51% for Medina/Cedeño vs. 43% for Mejía/Abinader; it was pointed out that Medina/Cedeño was strong among women (55% vs. 37%); that the majority (51%) thinks Medina will win in the first round; that Mejía has the strongest rejection among voters, 39% say they would never vote for Mejía, only 27% say the same about Medina; that 77% say that the election will be decided in the first round and that among these 77%, 57% think that Danilo Medina will win (39% think Mejía would win); and that 54% were more satisfied with the Fernández government (2004-2012), while 43% less satisfied with the Fernández government compared to the Mejía government (2000-2004).

There are many things to say about the presentation of this survey, all of which convinces me that this survey is ordered by PLD, the Medina (and in particular the Cedeño) faction or companies close to the PLD/Medina/Cedeño. But, first I have to declare that since I was not a journalist I did not receive the CD with the background data material that the survey is based on, I only received the print-out of the PPT slides that the Benenson representatives showed at the press-release. Therefore these comments are based on my impression from that press-conference and from the PPT-slides. Even though I am quite confident that this survey is ordered by the PLD, or indirectly by the PLD, this does not mean that the numbers the survey shows are wrong. On that account I can only say that I have no way of knowing whether they are correct or wrong. Second, according to the PPT-slides the survey is based on 1200 respondents, which should make out a reprentative sample, and the margin is +/- 2.83 points.

There are five elements that convince me the PLD is behind this survey: 1) the questions, which all are centered around what seems to be Danilo Medina's message in this campaign; 2) the slides; 3) the presentation of the slides by Benenson; 4) the fact that Benenson would not say who hired them; 5) the type of firm Benenson is.

1) Danilo has centered his message on several key issues, most of which were covered with questions in this survey. Medina focuses on the fact that he shall win the women, and together with Margarita Cedeño he highlights the women's importance, arguing that Margarita gives Danilo a dimension that Abinader does not give Mejía. Second, as mentioned above as well, Medina argues not only that he will win, he will win in the first round, and that he is the candidate that most people think will win (in addition to being the candidate that most people would vote for). Third, Medina and the PLD works as hard as they can to link Mejía (rightfully) to his disastrous rule in 2000-2004, and that is the worst (and most disliked) politician of this century. Fourth, even though Medina offers slogans of "cambio", it is qualified as "cambio seguro", which points out the insecurity of the erratic Mejía. In addition, Medina points out that he will continue that which is good. All of these elements were covered by questions in the survey. The survey's questions thus fits Medina's message quite well, and as such, works to confirm what Medina is arguing day in and day out to the public. The survey first points out that Danilo is more popular than Mejía, then by adding the vice-presidency to the ticket (and by excluding the rest of the candidates), the survey suggests that Margarita brings more to the table than Abinader (Mejía's vice-presidential candidate), which is victory in the first round for Medina. Then it looks at gender-support for the ticket, demonstrating strong female support for Medina/Cedeño, before it builds on Medina's message that people no matter what they vote, think that he will win, and with another question asking the ones who knows who to vote for whether they think it will be decided in the first round and who they think will win (yes, Medina). Finally, supporting Medina's message of "cambio seguro" and continue what is good, it looks at the rejection rate of the candidates and compares Fernández with Medina. The questions (and sum of answers) all fit Medina's message too well.

All of this is done quite well, and are relatively weak circumstantial evidence for my hypothesis. Therefore, I turn the attention to the slides which includes a couple of, maybe, equally weak circumstantial evidence (the reader will have to judge this). First of all, the slides highlights Medina's positive results through headings, everything in the text is written as to underscore the strength of Medina instead of presenting dull, statistical survey results, and to convince us that Medina will win in the first round. Only Medina is mentioned in headings with one exception to highlight Mejía's high rejection percentage. Second, as a consequence of the first point, Mejía's name is almost never mentioned, all is about Medina and Margarita Cedeño, and strangely enough Margarita Cedeño is always mentioned with first and last name, Medina only with first name (is it because she is a woman?, or is there some other reason?). 3) On the gender-based breakdown of support for the candidates, the slide highlights and circles how more women than men support Medina, it does not highlight that more men than women support Mejía. Granted, this difference is smaller, but could have been mentioned. All in all, the slides seem created to convince that Medina is the sure bet, which fits well with a theory that you believe the bandwagon-effect is important.

The presentation in itself also supports, in my view, the tendencies I note above. The oral presentation seemed to aim to convince us Medina would win. But, given the fact that these guys are professional survey analysts, some strange corners were cut in the presentation (and on the slides) that made Medina look better. First is the strange assessment by the presenter (who I think was Giancarlo Sopo, but I am not sure, I arrived a bit late) that when including Cedeño in the question the survey demonstrates Medina would win in the first round (and implying her importance being greater than Abinader's). This is basically a white lie given the fact that this question only asked about preference of the two main tickets Medina/Cedeño and Mejía/Abinader and excluded the smaller parties. Therefore Medina reached the 50% threshold, it was not because Cedeño was added. In fact Benenson's own numbers give Medina a three point increase when adding Cedeño to the question (and excluding all minor parties/candidates), but the same is the result for Mejía/Abinader. Also, the oral presentation highlighted all the positive numbers for Medina/Cedeño and highlighted any negative numbers for Mejía without any caveats. Again, I repeat myself, my impression is that the presentation was made to convince us that Medina would win, not to present dry results.

When asked by a journalist who had commissioned this survey, Benenson answered "a group of private companies" whose identity they could not disclose. This is probably true. A group of companies may have paid for this on a promise of anonymity. For all we know these companies might be owned by Félix Bautista (see my previous blog). However, given this fact, I do not trust the survey. Surveys may be manipulated and I see no valid reason why some companies, whichever they are, should want to hide themselves if they order a survey done. Of the surveys listed above, we know who ordered one of seven. This is the one ordered by Diario Libre, and in my view is the most reliable of the ones I have registered in March (but a source in the PLD tells me that these figures were fixed before published in the Diario Libre...if that is true, I do not know, but what is clear is that Diario Libre did what they could to present Mejía in a positive light in their presentation of that survey, and that on the second day of releasing results from the survey it became clear that Mejía's lead over Medina was somewhat more qualified than what was presented the first day). Given the fact that the DR is a democracy, albeit imperfect, there is no reason to hold back who orders a survey unless you want to hide that it may have been ordered for political reasons (which I believe is the case here).

Finally, Benenson lives of giving advice to politicians and uses surveys to do so. The use of surveys is used to fine-tune politicians' message, not to report results and inform the public. Therefore I am not surprised that the questions fit Medina's message so well (this, however, is no reason for the survey company to cheat with the survey, but many results can be created by the formulation of questions, etc). Benenson in fact brags in their webpages of all the politicians they have worked for (and they are mostly politicians...can the PLD be considered a private company?), why would they suddenly want to keep this a secret now. It could be nice for Benenson to have the PLD and Leonel Fernández as clients. Fernández holds a very good name in Latin America, why not put that on their webpage? I believe this survey is made with the purpose of giving advice to Medina and Cedeño, which is what Benenson does. It is therefore not an objective survey, and I do not trust its results. It may be that the correct figures are presented, or it might be that the correct figures are only presented to the candidates to fine-tune the message, and that Benenson gave advice to "juice" the official stats to win more support. We cannot know. I can basically see no reason for why Benenson would harm their name in producing bad surveys, but then again, they will do what is best for whoever contracts them. If the presented results are false, I presume the candidates have seen the correct results. The only motive for not presenting the correct results must be the fear of not getting a contract renewal for another survey if the results are bad for the candidate. But, as mentioned, I have not seen the data material and cannot say anything about the veracity of the results presented. What I do think I have argued well for is that Benenson's message seemed like ordered by the PLD: The questions, the slides and the presentation fit Medina's message extremely well, they seem created to convince the public that Medina is a sure bet, and therefore seem biased and non-trustworthy.

I must finally add that this long story of a survey which I think is paid for by the PLD or companies that support the PLD, is only one of probably many such examples in this (and previous) campaigns. I will probably not write extensively about other politicised surveys, but I want to add that this could just as well have been a story about a survey ordered by the PRD. I happened to write about this one since I had the opportunity to go to this press-conference.