Malacanang doesn’t want to suspend the public transport modernization program (PTMP), which detractors describe simply as a for-profit scheme, not a policy to support environmental protection as privately-owned cars and trucks emit more pollution and certainly not a means to pare down transport costs.
Fact is, the Rodrigo Duterte administration blamed jeepneys wrongly for being the root cause of monstrous traffic jams that Duterte was not supposed to suffer from when he failed to transfer Malacanang to Davao City. The program was hastily crafted not only to end the hissy fits of Duterte but to roll out a plan that counts out local manufacturers from the mix by trotting out the use of Euro 4-grade fuel for jeepney replacements, giving preferential treatment for China-made electric vehicles (EVs) and sectarian groups that have been trying to dominate the transport sector for so many decades.
Like the many botched programs promoted by ex-transport secretary Arturo Tugade, the jeepney modernization scheme was largely designed without the best interest of the 114,000 jeepney drivers and operators in mind, or the welfare of drivers who ply the routes as a sideline and the families that rely on jeepneys as their only means of livelihood. Many insiders have asked the Palace to just dump the PTMP as a sordid example of the corruption-ridden Duterte programs that benefited China inasmuch as the government was responsible for procuring the expensive Chinese vehicles even as the deal for operators and individual drivers was sweetened with “subsidies” on taxpayers’ dime.
The formation of coops and companies in the jeepney sector was also bruited about as a solution to the problem of viability, with the drivers and operators now obliged to pay for their vehicles through the coops or the companies that would manage the jeepneys. Despite this trick, the sellers will not part with their vehicles at cost, and the coops and jeepney companies would not join in without earning a cut from the sweetened package. How shall the drivers and operators earn their keep under this set-up? Fare would have to rise, as oil prices increase, and the riding public would have to subsidize the profits of oil companies as well.
At the outset, the PTMP was wrong as it pandered to the vain, illogical and irrational mindset of Rodrigo Duterte just as the Filipino people now suffers from the pollution of the airwaves due to the conniptions of Sara Duterte, a fan of Taylor Swift who horribly missed the concert of heavy rains and flooding that killed Filipinos as Typhoon Carina battered Luzon. The Dutertes lack empathy and no matter how long and furious their reaction to criticism is, they are all wrong.
It is now time for President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to undo what the Dutertes have done and he should heed the plea of 22 senators for him to just junk the Duterte-Tugade PTMP and toss it to the dung heap of history not only for the Duterte regime’s steamrolling the proposal but also for failing to consider that the China-made vehicles offered to drivers and operators are very expensive. Never mind if the same senators were mum when the butcher was still at the Palace when the dubious PTMP was designed to burn the pockets of drivers and operators.
Marcos Jr. should stop believing that PTMP was designed to improve the transport sector. He should look at the deals cut by the transport department under Tugade with the Chinese manufacturers. These companies are known to liberally gift their Filipino partners, including those in government, with more than decent commissions. “I disagree with them because sinasabi nila minadali. This has been postponed seven times, the modernization has been postponed for seven times,” Marcos said of the plea of the 22 senators. He also took the claim of agencies that 80% of operators complied with the requirement to consolidate into cooperatives for easier processing of bank loans to buy modern jeeps.
Yet, how do you explain the failure of these operators to serve Metro Manila routes that still rely on jeepneys? “Those that have been objecting or have been crying out and asking for suspension are in the minority,” Marcos Jr. said. “Pakinggan natin ang majority at ang majority sinasabi ituloy natin.” The fact that government has delayed the full implementation of the jeepney modernization program affirms the bogus claim that 80% of the routes had been consolidated. Officials claiming otherwise should stop shitting where they eat.
