Commuter group welcomes Bautista, challenges new DOTr to clean up Tugade mess
MANILA, Philippines (Updated 12:04 p.m.) — A transport advocacy network welcomed the appointment of former Philippine Airlines president Jaime Bautista to the Department of Transportation but urged him to “clean up the mess" it said was made by incumbent transportation chief Arthur Tugade.
Bautista, whose appointment was announced by president-elect Ferdinand Marcos Jr.'s camp Thursday, is inheriting a transport situation that commuters and transport workers say is in crisis, with insufficient transport capacity only worsened by skyrocketing gas prices.
In a statement, commuter group The Passenger Forum said that among the missteps of the DOTR are the haphazard and unjust implementation of the jeepney modernization program, their unresponsiveness to the gradual breakdown of the public transport system since the COVID-19 pandemic, the delay in the opening of the MRT-7, and the failure to rehabilitate the Ninoy Aquino International Airport.
“With our obvious differences with Tugade, it is a welcome development for us that he is not reappointed and that a new face will lead the DOTR. We challenge secretary-designate Bautista to start looking at how to solve the current transportation crisis that is the result of a series of wrong steps by the current DOTR," The Passenger Forum Convener Primo Morillo said.
Outgoing Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade was initially rumored to be in consideration for the position, though groups representing workers in the sector protested the possible re-appointment.
“We hope Bautista witnessed enough of these blunders and is willing to get his hands dirty in working for the betterment of our transportation situation. We hope he is willing to talk to other agencies like the DOE and the DPWH as solving commuter problems needs a whole-of-government approach,” Morillo said.
"We hope he will rechannel the government’s focus from car-centric infrastructures like elevated highways and road-widening to commuter-friendly ones such as railways and in-city integrated terminals like the PITX. We hope he will sit down and consult marginalized stakeholders like drivers and commuters to listen to our views and perspectives."
TPF also welcomed the appointment of new Transportation Undersecretary for Rails Cesar Chavez, a former Deputy Administrator of the Light Rail Transit Authority and also a former DOTr Undersecretary for Rails, to replace Usec. Timothy John Batan.
“Chavez has a good record during his short stint in the Duterte administration. He only resigned in the name of delicadeza when glitches happened in MRT-3 under his watch. We hope that he will again fight for the role of railways in solving our transportation issues,” Morillo said.
'Missed opportunity'
In an interview aired over ANC's Rundown, AltMobility PH director Ira Cruz said that the push for active transportation was a "missed opportunity," among others, for the outgoing transport administration as he urged the new set of leaders to bring a "service-oriented" culture to the department.
The commuter advocacy group said that it hopes to meet with incoming transportation chief Bautista to brief him about land transportation issues.
"There are a lot of reforms that we've mentioned time and again that are coming up as very urgent at this point with the decreasing supply of public transportation and the increasing supply of fuel," he said.
"They [also] could have implemented a legitimate network of bike lanes that are at good standards and sufficient to provide people with an alternative to private vehicles and reduce car-dependence."
Cruz added that the incoming transportation department had an opportunity to do away with the "boundary system" on public utility vehicles, where drivers and operators rely on the number of passengers they serve to get paid.
"We need to have a conversation that Libreng Sakay or service contracting is really not just about providing free rides but should have been an opportunity for government to reform the compensation system of the transportation-sector to one that is service-driven and not profit-oriented," he said.
"This is very important because in order for people to consider mass public transportation as a mode of transportation they can consider as their main or primary mode, it has to be efficient and reliable."
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