MANILA: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. called on his cabinet members on Thursday to render their resignations in a move seen as an attempt to address the public’s dissatisfaction over his administration’s performance.

Marcos, the son of a late Philippine dictator overthrown in 1986, won the presidency by a landslide in 2022 after campaigning on a vision of national unity and portraying himself as a candidate for change.

But public support for the 67-year-old leader has faced a steep decline this year, with surveys by Pulse Asia showing his approval rating with voters dropping to 25 percent in March from 42 percent in February.

Marcos’ latest move comes after his allies failed to secure a majority of contested Senate seats at the May 12 midterm elections, raising questions over the president’s weakened mandate in the remaining three years of his term, which ends in 2028.

“It’s time to realign government with the people’s expectations,” Marcos said in a statement issued by his office on Thursday.

“This is not business as usual … The people have spoken, and they expect results — not politics, not excuses. We hear them, and we will act.”

The call for courtesy resignations — described as a “bold reset” — marks “a clear transition” to a “more focused and performance-driven approach,” the statement reads.

At least 21 cabinet secretaries have either immediately submitted their resignations or expressed their readiness to do so.

The midterm elections were “reflective of the true desire and sentiments of the people on the ground,” said Froilan Calilung, political science professor at the University of Santo Tomas in Manila.

“There was a massive decrease in his numbers, and this could be attributed to the fact that there are no concrete measures, programs, or policies that can be attributed to his government for at least the past two or three years,” he told Arab News.

Pulse Asia’s survey in March also showed the majority of Filipinos expressing disapproval of the Marcos administration on issues seen as most urgent, including controlling inflation and fighting corruption, which stood at 79 percent and 53 percent, respectively.

“I think what the president is trying to do right now is to salvage whatever is left of his political capital before he enters the lame-duck phase of his administration, which could happen anywhere between the fourth and the fifth year of his term of office,” Calilung said. 

By calling for the resignations of his cabinet secretaries, Marcos may also be seeking to “shake off the stigma” of himself as a weak and indecisive leader and trying to project an “image of somebody who is in charge or is in control” of the situation, he added. 

Though it will be hard to recover after the “wasted” first three years of his presidency, there was still a chance that Marcos could make a comeback.

“The president should come up with better legislation, more well-meaning policies and programs that will directly address the current conditions of the current problems of inflation, job security, food security, agrarian self-sufficiency, among others,” Calilung said.

“If the president will be able to do these things, then I think there’s still some time to recover.”