Duterte vows to resolve car plate, license card problems

MANILA, Philippines – Presidential aspirant Davao City Mayor Rodrigo Duterte yesterday vowed to resolve the car plates and driver’s license problems at the Land Transportation Office (LTO) if he is elected.

Duterte, who spoke before businessmen at the SM Mall of Asia Arena in Pasay City, promised to immediately release the drivers’ licenses if he wins the presidency.

The LTO has received flak from the public over its P3.8-billion license plate standardization program.

Last February, some 600,000 license plates were abandoned at the Manila port after the private importer failed to pay duties and taxes amounting to P40 million.

The LTO also failed to issue drivers’ licenses after the Manila regional trial court stopped the award and payment of the agency’s P336-million license card deal with Allcard Plastics Philippines Inc.

Duterte also vowed to end corruption at the Bureau of Internal Revenue, Bureau of Customs and the LTO.

Duterte, who attended the NAITAS Travel and Trade Show 2016 in Pasay City, said his victory in the presidential race would be the best revenge of the businessmen.

Cayetano wants debate with Chiz

Vice presidential candidate Sen. Alan Peter Cayetano said he would abandon Duterte and instead campaign for Sen. Grace Poe if the latter’s runningmate, Sen. Francis Escudero, beats him in a one-on-one debate.

Cayetano challenged Escudero to defeat him in a 20- to 30-minute debate on his claims that Duterte cannot stop crime in six months.

Most talked about on FB

Duterte emerged as the most talked about presidential candidate on Facebook, with Cayetano surging ahead of his rivals in the vice presidential race.

Latest data from Facebook showed Duterte eating up 64 percent of election-related conversations from Nov. 20 to April 5.

Following him are administration bet Manuel Roxas II with 47 percent, Grace Poe with 40 percent, Vice President Jejomar Binay with 27 percent and Sen. Miriam Defensor-Santiago with 19 percent.

For the vice presidential race, Cayetano dominated the conversations with 44 percent, overtaking Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. who has 35 percent share of the discussions on the social media giant.

Closely behind them is Camarines Sur Rep. Leni Robredo with 33 percent, followed by Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV with 20 percent, Escudero with 16 percent and Sen. Gregorio Honasan with three percent.

Facebook said 15.2 million users worldwide have participated in conversations about the upcoming Philippine elections.

In terms of election-related issues, Facebook said transparency remains the most discussed, dominating the conversations with 66 percent.

The social media company, however, noted there has been an increase in conversations about education, social welfare, health and the environment since March.

Education and economy both had 30 percent share of the conversation, followed by social welfare with 25 percent, defense and foreign policy with 17 percent, health with 15 percent, infrastructure with six percent, environment with three percent and trafficking with one percent.  – With Janvic Mateo