Searches for “migrate” and “migrating” have surged Monday night, a Google Trends data showed.
Isaac Reyes of DataSeer, a data science & analytics training provider, told ABS-CBN News said there could be a causal relationship between the increase in search terms and the poll results.
“The sheer magnitude of the spike and the fact that the increased search volume occurred specifically in the hours following the release of the preliminary election results makes it likely that there was a causal relationship between the election results and increased Philippines search terms relating to migrating abroad,” he said.
Reyes, data scientist and lead trainer at DataSeer, said he made the Google Trends data analysis following a complaint from a friend on Facebook.
“I saw a post on Facebook from a friend who was complaining that she was going to move abroad because of the election results. While she was likely joking, I wondered whether there actually were citizens who had effectively “given up” on the Philippines and were ready to move abroad in frustration. So I turned to Google Trends for some actual data on the issue, and the results were far more extreme than I had expected,” he said.
The Google Trends data revealed that Filipinos preferred relocation destinations were Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.
Residents of Central Luzon, Metro Manila, and Calabarzon recorded the most interest in moving overseas.
Some Filipino netizens also took to Twitter to complain about the results.
“Disappointed with the partial results of elections, shall migrate as soon as possible,” one user wrote.
“Mga mumsh migrate na tayo after elections (let’s migrate after elections),” another user said.
Based on partial and unofficial results, reelectionist Sen. Cynthia Villar has taken an early lead in the Senate race.
Candidates from administration party PDP-Laban and regional party Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) had 11 bets in the top 12, while the opposition slate Otso Diretso had none, based on 92.76 percent of election returns of clustered precincts as of 4:50 a.m. Tuesday.
The unofficial count has been stalled by problems in the Commission on Elections’ transmission of election results to the transparency server.
