IT was bound to happen.
After all, the local government of Minglanilla has been on the receiving end of criticisms and curses from motorists for the traffic they have had to endure when they get to the southern municipality.
So last Thursday, the Minglanilla Traffic Command (Mitcom) conducted clearing operations along the national highway in Barangays Poblacion Ward 1 and 2. Mitcom was assisted by local police and personnel of the Department of Public Works and Highways 7.
They removed vehicles and ambulant vendors along the sidewalks and by the side of the road.
Local officials vowed to file charges against those who use the sidewalks or obstruct main roads.
And for a few hours, everything looked fine and dandy.
Authorities were able to show the public that they weren’t sitting on the problem, and everybody was lulled into believing that carmageddon in that part of the province would be a thing of the past.
But then the ambulant vendors started trickling back. To set up shop. At the very same spot where they had been unceremoniously evicted hours before.
“Wala kay mahimo. Gahi og ulo ang mga tawo. Ang mga tawo kulang sa disiplina (There’s nothing we can do. Some people are pig-headed. The people lack discipline),” was the lament of Engr. Valrico Tomol, head of the DPWH Second Engineering District’s Social, Environment and Road Right-of-Way Unit.
Well, I tend to have a high tolerance for people who eke out a living outdoors, especially in this climate. I understand that they are just trying to put food on their table. That for most of them, it’s a matter of survival.
But yes, Tomol is right.
These people have elected to be part of society, so they must abide by its rules and regulations. Although, I don’t mind looking the other way once in awhile.
After all, here in the Philippines, there are laws that must be followed and then there are laws that are there as mere suggestions, or because a legislator thought he needed to justify his undue influence or his pork barrel so he came up with something idiotic like squatting is not a crime.
However, I do not have the same patience or compassion for motorists who park their vehicles illegally by the side of the road or, worse, park on the sidewalk.
To those who still don’t know or who know but choose to ignore DPWH’s Department Order 73 series of 2014, it prohibits “the construction of building, houses, stores and junk shops on sidewalks; putting up signs, billboards, fences, walls, basketball courts, garbage cans, posts and telecommunication towers along the highway; and any activity that will obstruct pedestrians on the sidewalks and vehicles on the highways.”
So those drivers of vehicles that take up most of the sidewalk along Osmeña Blvd., particularly the one across Camp Sergio Osmeña Sr. in front of a printing shop or a lending firm or something like that, they are in clear violation of the law.
Then again, maybe they too have someone who is willing to look the other way.