Wednesday, July 02, 2008 Malilong: Keep jeepneys off our streets permanently By Frank Malilong The Other Side
DID you notice? Traffic in most parts of the city (at least those where I went to) was smooth and orderly yesterday. There we no crisscrossing vehicles that cut your lanes or stopped whenever and wherever they wanted. Thank God for the jeepney strike, for the first time in so many months, I was able to drive without my blood pressure soaring above 130/90.
Leaders of a militant drivers’ group gloated that they were able to paralyze public transportation in 80 percent of the city. I sympathize with the commuters who were the ones who bore the brunt of the strike but come to think it: something good and useful might come out of this supreme act of irrationality such us the establishment of a mass transit system that excludes the jeepney.
We can do without the jeepneys. In fact, we’re better off without them. As reader Tony Padua noted in a letter that he sent to opinion writers, on the day the drivers went on strike, the air was unusually clean and the view of the hills sharp and crisp.
The government has for long allowed itself to be held hostage by a group that has largely been acting like a child who goes into tantrums every time he does not immediately get what he wants. Perhaps, it’s time to spank the child. Keep the jeepneys permanently off the streets.
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A lady, who used to be a barangay chief in the city, had a harrowing experience in a bank in downtown Cebu last week. While waiting for her turn to be served, she felt the need to relieve herself and ask the bank’s security guard where their restroom was. He directed her to a structure outside the bank premises.
When she opened the door, a heavy stench assaulted her nostrils. The lady is not given to exaggeration and I believed her when she told me that to describe the toilet as filthy is an understatement.
She wanted to back out but she was feeling increasingly unable to control her bladder so she went inside only to find out that the room was not locked. Imagine yourself squatting, trying not to let your bottom touch a dirty urinal while your hands are busy pushing the door shut. It’s not a pretty sight.
When she went back inside the bank, she reported what she just went through to the manager. She was told that, in fact, they had a separate restroom upstairs but it was for the use only of bank employees and some (presumably favored) client. The explanation almost floored her.
The bank is one of the country’s largest. Its main office is located in one of the tallest buildings in uptown Cebu. If it cannot allow access to every client to the rest room in the second floor because of security considerations, then the least that it could have done was to have the one outside properly maintained. Surely, a few thousand pesos to pay a janitor will not impoverish the bank.
And what about our city health department? Is it not their job to see to it that establishments, especially those that cater to the general public, should meet the standards of sanitation? How often do their inspectors make their rounds?
The former barangay captain has sworn never to return to the bank’s downtown branch again. I wonder how many others have gone through her harrowing experience and made the same vow.
