From what I can tell, doing actions that raise the sympathetic takeover percentage (or the other types of takeover, for that matter) have no effect on region stats. Shouldn't they? If you're having your solders yell in the streets about how freedom and better times are coming, and the people are responding by being more sympathetic toward you, shouldn't that increase their Morale, at the least? Especially if their Morale is currently bleak?