SOME 200 members of the Pinagkaisang Samahan ng mga Tsuper at Operators Nationwide (Piston) Cebu will hold a march rally from SM City, Cebu, to the office of the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) 7 on Monday, Sept. 30, 2019.
Greg Perez, Piston Cebu president, said this is to show their support for their national counterpart, which plans to conduct a nationwide transport strike on Monday to protest the proposed phaseout of jeepneys and UV express service vehicles next year amid the government’s Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program (PUVMP).
“To show our support, we here in Cebu will hold a march rally. We will assemble at SM City Cebu at 8 a.m. And in the afternoon, some of them will already return to driving in their routes. Our activity will be held in the morning only,” he said in Cebuano.
Major transport groups Piston and the Alliance of Concerned Transport Organization (ACTO) have announced the staging of a nationwide transport strike this Monday.
Piston Cebu’s Perez clarified that they are not against the modernization, but just the immediate phaseout of jeepneys and UV express vehicles by July 2020.
“There’s even a possibility that our protest will go on after Monday because they have already given the drivers and operators the deadline of July 1, 2020. We will engage in a series of protests if our government does not take steps to help or to rectify these orders,” he said.
The LTFRB launched the PUVMP through the issuance of Department Order 2017-011 or the Omnibus Guidelines on the Planning and Identification of Public Road Transportation Services and Franchise Issuance in June 2017.
Under this program, jeepneys aged 15 years or older will be replaced with those with Euro 4 engines or electrically-run jeepneys to promote “safer and more comfortable” transport options.
Owners of the old jeepney units will receive P80,000 as subsidy for the acquisition of new units, representing five percent of the expected P1.6 million price of the new unit. The operators would have to finance the rest of the cost of the new vehicle through debt.
However, Perez believes that this is a “bogus” program.
“For us, this is a bogus program. It won’t improve the lives of our brethren in the transport sector,” he said. “The government wants individuals and small operators to surrender their franchises and their units with no assurance on what the government will return to them so that they can continue with their livelihood.”
As part of the fleet modernization initiative, the PUVMP encourages the merging of smaller transport industry players to form a consortium either by forming cooperatives or corporations.
The PUVMP also devolves the function of route planning to local government units (LGU), requiring them to submit their own Local Public Transport Plan as a pre-requisite for the opening of PUV franchises in their jurisdiction.
Perez said among the topics they will talk about during their Monday protest is the operators’ concern regarding the renewal of their franchises, corresponding penalties on traffic violations, and the price hike of gasoline.
No cause for worry
The Piston Cebu official said the public need not worry about the protest on Monday.
“Commuters should not use that as a reason to worry because even before the protest, many commuters were already crowding the streets for a ride because of the scarcity of jeepneys running, brought by their implementation of the jeepney phaseout. Only a small percentage of drivers will join the protest,” he said.
He also said those who will join the protest march are those drivers on their day off and some were taken from various routes such as jeepneys going to Englis, V. Rama, Mabolo, and those in Lapu-Lapu City to Cordova and vice versa.
LTFRB 7 Director Eduardo Montealto Jr. said there is nothing wrong with staging a protest march as long as it will not paralyze the city’s transportation system.
“It’s okay for them to stage a march rally. That’s their right. But if their purpose is to paralyze transportation, I hope they will remember that holding a franchise is a privilege. That means if they stage a rally, or go on strike, then they are no longer interested. We will now cancel their franchise. But of course, there will be due process. We will investigate,” he said in Cebuano.
Julito “Julie” Flores of the Cebu Provincial Bus and Minibus Operators Cooperative said they will help the LTFRB by deploying additional buses.
“We had initial talks with RD Montealto yesterday afternoon,” Flores said on Saturday, Sept. 28. “And we said we are willing to deploy around five buses and minibuses (or depending on how many will be needed) in the areas he will identify to have many stranded passengers. He said at 6 a.m. Monday, he will deploy his personnel to check which areas need reinforcements.”
The city governments of Cebu, Lapu-Lapu and Talisay will also deploy their corresponding buses if the transport rally affects commuters from their areas.
Cebu City Mayor Edgardo Labella said he will monitor the effects of the transport rally on Monday and deploy Kaohsiung buses if necessary.
Cebu City’s next door neighbor, Talisay City, is also preparing a “contingency plan” if members of the transport sector in their area decide to join the protesting drivers.
Jonathan Tumulak, City of Talisay Traffic Operations and Development Authority (CT-Toda) head, said Mayor Gerald Anthony “Samsam” Gullas Jr. has no plans of persuading drivers in his city to back out from the rally and will respect their decision.
Tumulak, however, said he has not heard from the city’s public transport groups that they will be joining Monday’s rally.
In Lapu-Lapu City, local officials will be on alert in case drivers join the transport rally.
Nagiel Bañacia, head of Lapu-Lapu’s City Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Office, said they will deploy two city-owned buses in case some commuters have a hard time getting a ride due to the transport rally.
But he believes jeepney drivers in Lapu-Lapu City will not stop their operations even with the transport rally on Monday. (WBS, JJL, KFD, WITH A REPORT FROM FMD OF SUPERBALITA CEBU / JKV)