EDITORIAL - The culpable culprits

The latest accident at a fireworks factory in Lapu-Lapu City which claimed a number of lives has once again made us think about where we are going wrong in dealing with such a risky industry.

To be sure, being such a risky industry, there is always some sort of a perverse expectation that something is going to go wrong somewhere and that when it happens, we are again going to measure the cost in number of lives lost.

But such a perverse expectation notwithstanding, we also sort of expect to see lessons learned after years of repetition of the same mistakes, such that we may, for instance, expect to see no more casualties involving very young children.

By this we mean that players in the industry should have, by now, learned to keep their young away from direct participation in their chosen calling, especially in the actual manufacture of firecrackers.

We may, for instance, acknowledge the need to have every available hand help make a living among the poor who are forced to take on such a challenging means of livelihood just to keep body and soul together.

But at least it should not be an absolute necessity for the very young to lay their lives on the line so early just to be able to help earn a few pesos daily. If at all, they should be kept out of harm's way and be made to participate only in the safer aspects of the trade.

We can already surmise that, as a result of this latest accident, officials will again be the favorite target of commentators, accused of failing to police and monitor such a dangerous industry.

But in fairness to these officials, there is only so much that they can do. The greater fault has to lie with the adult members of families engaged in such a risky trade. It is they who have the final say on such matters.

If the truth be told, industry insiders who are determined to play cat-and-mouse with the authorities on matters of safety can always do so with impunity, with the authorities ending up none the wiser at the end of the day.

That is because there can be no 24-hour monitoring of anything. The moment the authorities turn their backs, if but for a moment, somebody somewhere will always try to get one in edgewise.

In other words, more than anybody else's fault, any accident that happens within the fireworks industry will always have the fingerprints of the insiders themselves on it as the culpable culprits.