Dreading the traffic

For the many motorists and drivers groaning over exorbitant fines imposed to traffic violations caught on camera under the No Contact Apprehension Policy (NCAP), the quick response by the Supreme Court (SC) on two petitions against it was a welcome relief. In a matter of few days, the 15-man High Tribunal acted on two petitions against the NCAP and issued temporary restraining orders (TROs) to suspend its implementation until further notice.

Covered by the TRO are the six local government units (LGUs), the Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA), and the Land Transportation Office (LTO) enjoined to suspend the NCAP implementation. The SC likewise ordered all of them to submit their respective comments on the two petitions.

However, the High Court is now seen as seemingly not in a hurry to resolve quickly the public issues and concerns for and against the NCAP. It set the oral arguments for the two petitions on January 23, 2023 yet.

This was raised during our face-to-face Kapihan sa Manila Bay breakfast news forum last Wednesday at the Café Adriatico in Remedios Circle, Malate. In particular, former Kabataan party list Congressman Terry Ridon who now heads the InfraWatch PH urged the Mayors of the six LGUs named in the SC injunction to file their respective motions for reconsideration (MRs) and ask for a re-setting of the oral arguments earlier than the scheduled date next year.

Meanwhile, Ridon cited the respective Mayors of the cities of Manila, Muntinlupa, Parañaque, Quezon City, San Juan, and Valenzuela have noted improvements in the busy sections and areas where the NCAP system were installed. These six LGUs entered individually into a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) agreement with a company called Qpax Traffic Systems Inc., the service provider and operator of the closed circuit television (CCTVs) system being used in the NCAP. But the MMDA and the LTO are not party to this PPP deals.

While the NCAP is suspended, the MMDA and the six LGUs have increased the deployment of their respective traffic enforcers. Hence, they have gone back on the road to their usual, visual enforcement and apprehension of violators of traffic rules and regulations.

Ridon insisted the NCAP have “dismantled the ground level corruption” among unscrupulous traffic enforcers. Thus, Ridon expressed grave concern that the NCAP will remain suspended while waiting four to five months before the SC oral arguments. In the meantime, the resumption of face-to-face classes has increased vehicles on the road amid the seasonal high traffic volume during the Christmas holidays.

The Christmas traffic season starts as early as September with the onset of the so-called –ber months.

Incidentally, the MMDA acted swiftly in deploying traffic enforcers in the two consecutive very busy intersections along Gil Puyat Avenue (formerly called Buendia) and Dian St. in the city of Makati. Kudos to both the MMDA and the city government of Makati in restoring the flow of traffic while the busted traffic lights at these busy intersections are still being repaired.

In the second TRO, the SC barred the LTO from data sharing motorist information with LGUs enforcing the NCAP. Complying with the TRO, the LTO removed starting last Wednesday the alarm tagging of unpaid fines from NCAP notice of violations to allow the registration of vehicles.

The MMDA has and operates its own CCTV system. Moreover, both the LTO and the MMDA have their respective sets of fines and penalties though much lower than those imposed by the six LGUs with NCAP. And both, too, have their own adjudication body through which alleged traffic infractions can be contested by drivers and motorists. On the other hand, the six LGUs passed and approved their own local ordinances implementing higher set of fines and provided likewise their own adjudicating bodies.

During our Kapihan sa Manila Bay news forum, Roberto Valera, LTO deputy director for law enforcement services disclosed a technical working group (TWG) representing the six LGUs, the MMDA, the LTO, and the National Privacy Commission was created to resolve expeditiously these differing provisions on traffic violations and fines and other issues raised against the NCAP.

In the TWG review of the NCAP, Valera expressed the LTO desire to include the provisions of the Data Privacy Law. As the repository of all vehicle registrations and drivers’ license data, he cited, the LTO has been mandated to fully protect all personal information submitted to the agency.

Valera welcomed the NCAP as “force multiplier” for the traditional “visual” enforcement of transport laws of the land. Valera pointed out the LTO was mandated to implement a “demerit” point system against drivers frequently involved in traffic violations and accidents under Republic Act (RA) 10930. Drivers accumulating 40 demerit points will be meted out a two-year suspension of drivers’ license under this law that extended the drivers’ licenses to ten years, Valera cited. Signed into law in August, 2017, LTO has no available data on how many drivers got their licenses suspended due to “demerit” system of RA 10930.

Lawyer Robert Consunji, board of trustees of the National Auto Club of the Philippines, could not agree more on the need for NCAP system, and perhaps even expand its coverage, not only to manage the flow of traffic, but as a road safety behavioral change of drivers. At the Kapihan sa Manila Bay breakfast news forum, Consunji pointed out the MMDA was, in fact, the first to implement NCAP since 2016. Consunji cited the NCAP applies artificial intelligence (AI) in the MMDA’s traffic control and management using its own CCTV system to monitor major thoroughfare choke points such as in the whole stretch of EDSA. While the AI does this job, Consunji explained, there is still human intervention, or the MMDA technical people manning their CCTV network.

What must be done now is really to further refine and improve the present NCAP as now being worked on by the inter-agency TWG. For now, we brace and dread for the more traffic ahead of us. Paging, Supreme Court.