TWO executive orders and an advisory affecting the elderly aged 65 or over and students/minors were issued by three government offices over the weekend, to take effect Sunday, March 22, at 3 p.m.
[1-2] Cebu Gov. Gwen Garcia and Presidential Assistant for the Visayas Michael Lloyd Dino would impose a 24-hour “curfew” on aged-65-or-plus seniors and students to protect them from the threat of coronavirus.
[3] Cebu City Mayor Edgardo Labella would have the aged-65-or-plus seniors and minors “stay at home” during the period of emergency.
People’s acceptance
Most people have accepted the need to submit to government restrictions since President Rodrigo Duterte issued Proclamation 929 declaring a state of calamity for six months starting March 16; Governor Garcia imposed travel bans starting March 15 on people from specific provinces or towns entering Cebu; andMayor Labella declared a general community quarantine in Cebu City starting March 16.
The noise in social media about the ban on travel outside one’s home has been more visceral than anything else. Some commentators in print and broadcast questioned authority of LGUs, sought to clarify, or were just routinely carping.
Rant in digital space and needling by regular media are inevitable. They’re part of the “feedback.” Public officials may shut the din out but at a certain cost: they won’t know what many of their constituents are thinking and what confuses them. Understanding the order is crucial to complying with the said order.
Not clear enough?
Perhaps not made more clear or not stressed vigorously enough are these:
[1] The elderly or student/minor will not be detained (or “killed” or “tortured” as some crazy internet comments speculated). They will be confronted, checked on their age and occupation and purpose of their being outside the house, and sent home if they’re not covered by the exception. Not one of the EOs and advisory says about locking up the violators, at least for now.
[2] The exceptions are adequate to allow valid reasons for essential trips out of the house: medical emergency, health care work and the like. In case of doubt, law enforcers are expected to decide in favor of practicality and compassion. The EOs didn’t say that but the public expects it.
Applicability, uniformity
There are legitimate questions, though, that administrators of the quarantine/lockdown can put to rest:
[1] Does one local government’s EO cover only the people within its area of jurisdiction or does it apply also to people in other places outside that area? Specifically, does the governor’s order take effect also in highly urbanized and independent cities–such as Cebu City, Mandaue City and Lapu-Lapu City–which territorially are part of Cebu?
[2] Won’t it be less confusing and easier to follow if the rules from different authorities are uniform?
Students and minors
That is strikingly shown in the coverage of students and minors. Cebu City’s E.O. speaks of “minors” while Capitol’s E.O. and OPAV’S advisory mention “students.”
Guv Gwen’s order specifies elementary, high school, college and unemployed post-graduate students.
Those not named are deemed excluded, which will exempt jobless persons who had not schooled or dropped out and not graduated. In contrast, Mayor Labella’s E.O., which bans minors, will exempt those who are aged 18 or over, regardless of whether they’re employed or not.
It is a situation similar, in a lesser scale, to the curfew hour for other people: 8 p.m. in Cebu City and 10 p.m. in Cebu province.
Uniformity in the rules is not mandatory but it results in less confusion and lends a sense of coordination and cooperation to the LGUs’ work. And police and military will appreciate the simpler order.
May be corrected, cleared
Those are, of course, kinks that may be ironed out and ambiguities that may be cleared. The E.O.s, after all, will still be supported by ordinance: from the Provincial Board and from the city council or towncouncil in each LGU.
So are the remarks, well-meaning or snide, in the social media premature and misplaced? Not if they can help in a better crafting of the rules. For example, the comment to exclude from the ban students in high school and college–who are usually relied on by the elderly to run errands for them—may lead lawmakers to consider that reality on the ground.
Central authority
As to questions on authority of LGU to restrict activities in their respective areas, we may assume they’reauthorized to do so and they don’t contradict the standing order of President Duterte that it is the centralgovernment, through the inter-agency task force and the office of the president, that “calls the shots.”
Assume that the LGUs rules, and those of the president’s assistant for the Visayas, conform to and do notcontradict the IATF and Malacañang orders. And if they do, assume that the central leaders will dosomething about it, as the president already did, in his order for some local government leaders in Luzon to “stand down.”