The majority of senators have now thrown their support behind a resolution urging the government to temporarily suspend the implementation of the Public Transport Modernization Program (PTMP), formerly known as the Public Utility Vehicle Modernization Program (PUVMP), to pave the way for a review and address issues raised by transport groups.
Proposed Senate Resolution No. 1096, which was authored and signed by 22 of the 23 remaining senators, following the appointment of Sen. Juan Edgardo Angara as education secretary, calls for the program to be put on hold “pending the resolution of valid and urgent concerns raised by affected drivers, groups, unions, and transport cooperatives with the end in view [of] ensuring a more efficient and inclusive implementation of the PTMP.”
They added that more consideration and clarifications were needed from the Department of Transportation (DOTr) to address concerns voiced by affected sectors, especially drivers.
Under the modernization program, jeepney operators and drivers must consolidate or join or form cooperatives to ply their routes and avail of government assistance in modernizing and managing their fleets, among other services.
This is a part of a process toward the phaseout of traditional jeepneys and their replacement with eco-friendly but more expensive modern units that will be partly subsidized by the government.
The senators noted that 36,217 PUV units or about 19 percent failed to consolidate despite the April 30 deadline. They attributed this to the government’s failure to properly educate drivers, operators, and transport groups about the program, as well as the “burden of financing the cost of modern PUVs, which greatly exceeds the financial capacity of drivers and operators.”
The DOTr did not immediately respond to calls for comments on the Senate resolution, while transport groups that supported the program have threatened to go on strike and not vote for senators who signed the resolution.
The suspension of its implementation to pave the way for a review of a critical yet controversial program like the PTMP or PUVMP is something that should have been long overdue, especially given the widespread protests that were mounted against it by the drivers and operators who expect to bear the brunt of the cost of modernization. However, as the deadline has already passed and majority of the sector has already been cowed into compliance, it may already be too late in the process.
Because nobody acted accordingly in a timely manner, it would seem that this resolution is but a knee jerk solution by the legislative body that also passed the law, which apparently turns out to be flawed. Whether it is still helpful or not, time will tell, but this is a problem that could’ve been avoided had the law and its implementation been thoroughly studied instead of railroaded.
Hopefully the legislators who are now demanding a review of the PTMP or PUVMP, or whatever they want to call it to make it sound better, will have learned from this particular lesson and put more effort into crafting laws and programs that look at the big picture and the long game instead of trying to be as quick as possible, only to stop and ask for a review when they forget that the devil is in the details.*
