No reason for suspension (PUVMP)

[Lee]

Quote

 

TWENTY-TWO senators have signed a resolution urging the government to suspend its Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program (PUVMP), concluding that it was implemented without proper planning and was rushed. In so doing, they are swallowing hook, line and sinker the arguments from a noisy minority of jeepney drivers who have opposed any move to get them to replace their rundown, aging and diesel-burning vehicles.

The senators have also fallen for the line that the program was rushed when it actually began in 2017 and has been tweaked over the last seven years. In fact, in those "rushed" years, the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board notes that the program has achieved an 80-percent consolidation rate for jeepneys. This reinforces the fact that the senators, in their ill-considered resolution, are putting a minority that refuses to play by the rules in the driver's seat.

Backing those "poor" jeepney drivers might be politically attractive and appear populist, but it condemns the riding public to an antiquated, unhealthy and unsafe system of public transport that should have been banished a long time ago.

Fortunately, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. appreciates all this and insists that the program continue, notwithstanding the senators playing to the gallery.

Speaking to reporters on an official trip to Pampanga this week, Mr. Marcos said the PUVMP was actually favored by the majority of jeepney drivers and operators, and suspending it would be allowing the minority to dictate the fate of the entire public transport system.

"I disagree with them (the senators) because they are saying it was rushed," the President said during a chance interview. "The modernization has been postponed seven times. And those that have been objecting or been crying out and asking for suspension are in the minority."

"Eighty percent [of jeepney drivers and operators] have already consolidated. So what do we do? [Let] the 20 percent ... decide the fate of 100 percent? So let us listen to the majority, and the majority says we must continue. So that's what we will do," he added.

As if to emphasize this point, some 5,000 drivers and operators of transport cooperatives who have complied with the PUVMP requirements held a "unity walk" from the Welcome Rotunda in Quezon City toward Mendiola, Manila, earlier this week to protest the Senate resolution.

"The message we want to convey to the President is clear," Ed Comia, president of the Angat Kooperatiba at Korporasyon ng Alyansang Pilipino para sa Modernisasyon, said in Filipino. "He needs to ignore the Senate's recommendation. He should reject it and allow the modernization to proceed."

Nor were the expressions of support limited to Metro Manila. At least 22 Cebu transport groups and cooperatives gathered at Fuente Osmeña Circle for their own unity walk against calls to suspend the program.

"The program already started, and we have complied. It is an insult to us who already invested resources to comply with the program," Ellen Maghanoy, president of the Federation of Cebu Transport Cooperatives, said in Cebuano and English.

"It is also unfair for us that our senators will just suspend the PUVMP," she added.

In January, seven major transport groups, led by Pasang Masda, that support the PUVMP filed a petition before the Supreme Court opposing moves to stop it. They were joined by the Alliance of Transport Operators and Drivers Association of the Philippines, the Alliance of Concerned Transport Organization, and the Liga ng mga Transportation at mga Operator sa Pilipinas.

It is curious that, in all the accounts about the recent Senate hearings, there were no reports that the senators even bothered to talk to drivers and operators who have already complied with the program. If they were interested in more than just headlines that made them sound "pro-poor," surely they could have received testimony as well from Pasang Masda or any of the other major transport groups that support the program.

That these senators chose to focus only on the complaints of a noisy minority indicates they were less interested in the whole truth than in the opportunities to grandstand.

In the interest of this truth, we wonder how many of the 22 senators actually brave the dust and pollution, and exposure to the elements and take a "traditional" jeepney to work every day.

And when it comes to fares, it isn't enough for them to shrug and say these unsafe vehicles are all the poor can afford to ride. They really should be asking, in terms of health and safety, what do they deserve? Certainly, it is better than unsafe and unhealthy rides every day

 

No reason for suspension (msn.com)

[hk blues]

This argument is nothing to do with the customer but everything to do with the jeepney drivers. 

i am on the fence as I see the benefit of the program but at the same time how it won't work at this moment.

 

 

[Possum]

Big to do over nothing. Just because it's a law doesn't mean it will be enforced. Nothing has changed where I live. You can still get a taste for life in the Philippines when you're on a tricycle stuck behind a jeepney breathing that wonderful jeepney exhaust.  You can also see the bald tires they have while you're getting poisoned by these iconic quaint vehicles that stop every 50 meters. The LGUs aren't about to enforce this modernization law as elections are right around the corner so chill out and enjoy the ride.