Why leave your driver’s license at the village gate?

ISANG BANSA, ISANG I.D.: It’s again the season for debating the question of adopting one national identification card system and stopping harassment of motorists at village gates.

With the onset of a new year, private subdivisions are again selling new vehicle stickers, demanding drivers’ licenses and provoking protests from motorists. Technical groups in Congress are studying proposals for a consolidated ID system. The Commission on Elections is evaluating bids for a Voters’ Registration and Identification System. And various government agencies continue to issue their own credit card-type IDs.

Senate President Franklin M. Drilon is pressing the consolidation of government-issued identification cards into a national ID system, instead of setting up a new ID system that would cost around P13 billion.

Drilon is eyeing for consolidation the IDs issued by the Government Service Insurance System, Social Security System, Land Transportation Office, Comelec, Bureau of Internal Revenue, and the Philippine Health Insurance Corp.

He noted that the identification system for voters (who are 18 years old and above) being offered by Photokina to the Comelec requires P6.5 billion. An ID system for the entire population can cost easily P13 billion, he said.

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RUCKUS AT VILLAGE GATE: If the Drilon consolidation plan is adopted, what happens when a gate guard in a private subdivision or village requires a non-resident motorist to surrender his driver’s license?

That would deprive the driver of a valuable ID needed in transacting business elsewhere. Even if he does not need his license/ID elsewhere that day, as a matter of principle he has reason not to surrender it.

Just to raise revenue, many subdivisions are forcing visitors to buy their 2002 gate stickers for unhampered entry. Motorists who refuse to buy the new stickers are being forced to leave their licenses at the gate.

Somebody should sue over this oppressive practice. At least that’s more civilized than a police colonel’s once mauling a gate guard at BF Homes in Parañaque who told the officer’s wife to surrender her license.

Our view is that once a private subdivision allows the use of government funds in building, upgrading or maintaining its roads, especially the main street traversing the gate, it can no longer bar the reasonable entry of a licensed driver.

It is illogical to use taxpayers’ money to build or maintain a road and then bar taxpayers from using that road just because they refuse to buy a sticker or to surrender their licenses.

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PUBLIC FUNDS, PRIVATE ROADS?: There are many private subdivisions whose main roads have been repaved, upgraded, lighted or landscaped by the local government or some politician using government funds. Such improvement is usually proclaimed in huge billboards put up by the politician sponsoring the project.

When it uses taxpayers’ money for its roads, we submit, the private subdivision loses all excuses for barring taxpayers, or requiring them to surrender their licenses before entry. (But self-sufficient enclaves – such as Forbes Park and Ayala-Alabang – that do not use government funds for their road system are able to justify strict requirements for the entry of non-residents.)

In some cases, subdivision developers accept government assistance and then donate the streets (plus the responsibility of maintaining them) to the government. But even without such a formal donation or turnover, we submit that the mere acceptance, especially after solicitation, of government funding for road maintenance automatically makes the thoroughfares public.

We invite Drilon, a topnotch lawyer, and other officials sponsoring such public works in private subdivisions to comment on this sore point. Victims of such harassment at village gates may want also to share their experience.

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SINK HOLES IN BUDGET: Businessman Enrique J. Zobel thought of going over the budget of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and was shocked by the reckless allocation of millions in scare government resources tucked under the catch-all heading of "other services."

"If we remember that for a corruption charge amounting to P50 million, a public official can be charged with the capital offense of plunder, could ‘creative budgeting,’ as I would like to call it, be in fact a bigger case of plunder?" he asked.

He gave samples:

• Of the P3.9 billion for programs and locally-funded projects, P706 million is given to an item listed as "Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses" (MOOE). The biggest chunk of this MOOE goes to a vague "Other Services," which gets P232 million, or a little over 30 percent.

• The appropriations for foreign-assisted projects amount to P1.6 billion, of which P835 million goes to MOOE. From that MOOE, P525 million, or more than half a billion pesos, again goes to certain "Other Services."

• Total MOOE for the Metro Manila Air Quality Improvement Sector Development Program is P197 million. A whopping 97 percent of it, or P191.9 million is allocated for "Other Services."

("No wonder our air quality does not get any better," Zobel noted. "Of the nearly P200 million for management and operating expenses, 25 percent disappears into the pockets of consultants, 20 percent disappears into ‘monitoring’ and another 20+ percent disappears into building the ‘capacity’ of God knows what.")

• In a project called Southern Mindanao Integrated Coastal Zone Management Project, total MOOE is P100 million. Nearly P90 million of this goes to "Other Services" – and P50 million of that goes to "consultancy services." Calculated on a daily basis, including Saturdays and Sundays, this amounts to P138,888,888 spent each day for consultants (including PR consultants?) alone.

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"I’m told that funds under ‘Other Services’ are available to the big bosses of the department," Zobel said, "What do they do with it?"

He went on to ask more questions: If this type of budgeting is done by the DENR, could it not also be done by other departments? If it was done for the 2002 budget, was it done for the 2001 budget and all other previous budgets?

"Should not someone take the trouble of investigating this, maybe the Commission on Audit, maybe even the Makati Business Club, the Chamber of Commerce . . .?" Zobel asked. "I only casually checked the budget and look what I found."

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