Can’t fix traffic? Get out of office

One can’t walk straight on our roads. A few paces on the sidewalk you’d have to step off. Barring your path are sari-sari store benches, with neighborhood bums boozing the day away. Speeding, honking tricycles would make you jump back up the footway. Continuing to stroll, you’ll zig and zag past more obstacles: waste bins, flower pots, a busted fridge left there years ago, bags of cement and sand for house repair, a woman frying banana-cue for sale, men having haircuts while watching a chess game, dangling live electrical wires, a wayward barangay outpost where loll more “istambays”, and what have you. They represent the madness in the streets, to which the Dept. of Interior and Local Government is at last tooting, “Stop, disiplina muna!”

Barangay officers have been given 75 days starting last Feb. 17 to clear all tertiary roads and walkways of obstructions. The objective is to “return the streets to the people,” says DILG Sec. Eduardo Año. Too many have arrogated part of the roads to themselves like it’s their right. If evicted they yell, “Katarungan, Presidente!” For two-and-a-half years a church congregation occupied two lanes of Commonwealth national highway in Quezon City for weekend Masses, and departed only in 2019 when their chapel finally was refurbished. By then they had cost taxpayers millions of pesos in delayed construction of that stretch of the MRT-7 commuter railway. Co-religionists trapped in the traffic could only sin and curse the insensitive priest who started it all and the bishop who abetted him: “Sana kunin na sila ni Lord.”

Año’s barangay directive is the second phase of the road clearing began in July 2019. One hundred-thirty six city and 1,488 municipal mayors then were given 60 days to remove obstructions from primary and secondary roads. That is, highways that connect provinces and streets that feed to them. It was the first time mayors were made to do their jobs under pain of punishment. Just reelected, many hesitated as they deemed road clearing unpopular. Some were the very causes of the obstructions they verbally had permitted. But if Manila Mayor Isko Moreno could clear in two weeks Divisoria, Quiapo and Sta. Cruz that street vending syndicates had choked for decades, then why not them? In the end compliance was 92 percent, Año reports; 6,682 primary and secondary roads were cleared. Ninety-seven mayors flunked the basic test of governance. The 12 worst of them were charged before the Ombudsman with administrative negligence. They face suspension or perpetual bar from public office; good riddance.

Año intends to keep the momentum. Tertiary or inner roads must now be cleared too in 42,045 barangays. Obstructions include:

(1) Vehicles parked in prohibited places or along roads not intended for vehicular parking;

(2) Undesignated vehicular terminals;

(3) Vending sites;

(4) Obstructing house encroachments, protruding gates, the conduct of household activities, tents except those for temporary use such as for wakes;

(5) Store encroachments, and indiscriminate signages and advertisements;

(6) Obstructing barangay outposts, halls, markers, and directories;

(7) Conduct of sports, sports facilities; and other related activities;

(8) Drying of rice or other crops;

(9) Construction materials;

(10) Debris, waste materials, and other junked items; and

(11) Other structures, materials, or activities identified by the local government unit.

Trees that encroach or pose hazards may be pruned or felled under DENR guidance. Obstructive public utility structures or facilities must be removed or relocated by LGUs in coordination with concerned utility companies. Same with obstructions caused by national government projects. First to go should be barangay offices and police outposts that block vehicle and pedestrian flow, Año says.

LGUs must review or enact ordinances for road clearing operation, inventory the roads in their jurisdiction, regularly remove obstructions, remedy the displacement of affected folk, and rehabilitate cleared roads. They also must set up grievance mechanisms by which citizens can report unremoved obstructions, provide suggestions, or voice out implementation concerns.

Provincial governors are to ensure compliance of mayors, and enforce provincial ordinances and DILG issuances. Mayors in turn must monitor barangay compliance. If they can’t do the job, they have no right to be in office, warns Año, a stern former Armed Forces chief.

Citizens are encouraged to report malingering local officials. Simply send videos or photos of the obstructions to the DILG complaints website, with locations and date stamps. Then watch heads roll.

That goes for noncompliance too with the ban on tricycles from national highways. The prohibition is contained in the Land Transport and Traffic Code of 1964. As well, in DILG Memo Circular No. 2007-01 of Jan. 2, 2007: “To All City and Municipal Mayors, Vice Mayors, Sangguniang Panlunsod and Sangguniang Bayan Members, DILG Regional Directors, and Others Concerned: Basic Considerations in the Preparation of City or Municipal Tricycle and Pedicab Franchise and Regulatory Ordinance.”

Tricycle removal has to be done in 30 days. Side roads, flyovers and terminals must be paved to clear the highways.

Road clearing and tricycle-ban enforcement can have unintended results: less road crashes, community health and sanitation, safety consciousness, self-discipline, social responsibility.

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