Hagad: Do they bite their elbows too?

I GUESS it’s the reason why I cannot be a politician at this point in our country’s political history. I cannot win because I cannot think and behave like one.

Take this matter about the two flyovers that Congressman Anthony Golez announced will soon be constructed along the Araneta-Magsaysay and the Lacson-Bata intersections. If I read the news report about it correctly, our local Congressman and Chief Executive urgently pushed for the project reportedly because it’s part of former President Gloria Arroyo’s bridge development program and P800,000,00 pesos has already been appropriated for them. Sayang if we let that huge amount of money go and have someone else spend it, the proponents seem to imply.

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To my non-politician mind, the bigger and better question to ask should have been: does the traffic situation along Araneta-Magsaysay and Lacson-Bata justify the national government’s spending P800M of our public funds? Have studies been conducted which show that these two points of entry and exit from downtown Bacolod have so reached a saturation point or will soon be so clogged with traffic that only a fly-over will solve it? To tell you the truth, I pass by these two points quite often during a normal week and traffic over there is tolerable.

There are two points in Bacolod where vehicular congestion can get to be so chaotic as to raise one’s blood pressure. These are Lacson Street fronting the Robinson’s Place and the junction along the Circumferential and Burgos Sts., near the Lopue’s East Centre. But even these do not really cry for fly-overs; just a firm and consistent enforcement of traffic regulations will do it.

Bacolod’s roadway network in fact has been so well planned that if discipline, both with respect to vehicular and pedestrian traffic, will only be inculcated on drivers and street-crossers, we should be free of congestion for years to come. Both road experts and ordinary people have seen this obvious fact; residents in other cities in fact look at our road network with undisguised envy, yet our local government appears blind and unaware about it.

A firm and strict enforcement of existing traffic and pedestrian ordinances will not cost P800 million, yet our city mayor and our Sangguniang Panlungsod members do not seem to see it that way. How then do we expect our Traffic Enforcers to take them more seriously? And assuming the flyovers will improve the situation along Araneta-Magsaysay and Bata, how is that going to help the rest of Bacolod when everywhere else inside is chaotic? Who benefits from the P800 million budget then?

Truth to tell, it’s selfish of us to grab that large amount of money simply because “It is there for the taking”, without considering whether or not it will be better spent on some other worthier government program. Why don’t we just allow it to be reverted back to the National Treasury, to be reallocated into something that present and future generations will thank us for?

I am reminded that at home, I have sometimes acted the same way – spending hard-earned money on non-essentials “because it is there”. I invariably bite my elbow and blame myself when a better need comes around and the money is no longer there. I hope our officials in government have learned to bite their own elbows, too.