Pasay City councilors sue MRT

Pasay City Vice Mayor Greg Alcera and seven city councilors filed charges yesterday against the Metro Rail Transit (MRT) consortium and the secretaries of the public works and highways and the transportation and communications departments for the anomalous construction of the MRT line in Pasay.

Alcera and councilors Romy Cabrera, Connie Dy, Allan Panaligan, Arvin Tolentino, Pete Tianzon, Reynaldo Padua and Eduardo Advincula filed civil charges of abatement of nuisance with the Pasay City Regional Trial Court. The officials accused the respondents of misinformation and misrepresentation in building the MRT railways on the city’s stretch of EDSA not according to the original plans.

Alcera explained that the original plan was for the railway to be elevated so that the two busy intersections of EDSA-Malibay and EDSA-Tramo remain open to the city’s motorists and pedestrians.

However, the officials said the MRTC, abetted by the Department of Public Works and Highways and Department of Transportation and Communications, went on to a ground-level construction of the railtracks.

The ground-level construction, the complainants said, resulted in the closure of the two intersections and the isolation of residents of barangays Malibay and Tramo from the rest of the city. – Rainier Allan Ronda