Yes! Let's go back to a two-party system, but.

During the 888 Forum last week, congressmen Benhur Salimbangon and Luigi Quisumbing renewed their call for the return to the two-party system. I fully concur with their observations but shouting out to the world for the return of a two-party system will not change our present dysfunctional party system. They should focus their call directly into the ears of Pres. Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino, III who refuses to change our constitution.

We know that both Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile and House Speaker Feliciano “Sonny” Belmonte are already convinced that this nation needs to change its charter for the various economic reasons that they were proposing. But like it or not, there’s just too many of us who believe that we must change the charter. The Abueva Commission in the mid-2000 already did a nationwide consultation on charter changes and has shown that the people outside Metro Manila are convinced for the need for charter changes.

Alas, the people of Metro Manila are just too contented with the status quo, while the rest of us Filipinos continue to suffer the inequities due to the centralized system of governance. One political change we need so badly is the return to a two party system and to abolish the so-called party-list representation, which we know has been so abused, it no longer truly represents the so-called under-represented sector.

Worse of all, the party-list system has become the entry point of the so-called “above ground” allied front supporting the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP). To name a few, we have Akbayan, Bayan, Gabriela, etc. etc. What is even worse is that, these groups also get their fair share of the hated pork barrel and thus, they now have the funds that they need to destroy the very democracy that we have established.

In short, as we say in Cebuano, “Gi luto ta sa atong mantika!” (We are being cooked in our own oil). But then how can we change our charter if the most important person whom both Rep. Salimbangon and Rep. Quisumbing ought to convince to change our charter refuses to do so. It really gets my guts when Pres. PNoy once quipped, “The Akbayan and me think the same way.” Of course the CPP/NPA/NDF also doesn’t want to change our charter because they know that cha-cha would usher a new type of governance that would truly be pro-people rather than its being so pro-politician.

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I still can’t get over that incident in M. Velez St. when Mayor Michael Rama had to handle traffic because there were no Citom enforcers in that traffic congested area. But then do we always need to have traffic enforcers around? Perhaps many of us have forgotten that driving is a privilege granted by the State, and it is incumbent upon us drivers to obey our traffic laws even if we have no traffic enforcers around.

But the reality on the ground is that, we have so many reckless drivers who think that they own the road, and that they have a divine right to drive as they please. We’ve seen this in so many jeepney, taxi or bus drivers and yes a lot of reckless “habal-habal” drivers who ride on our roads as they please, regardless of the fact that they are endangering people’s lives. But what do you think is worse than these reckless drivers? Well, I encountered one of them yesterday at 10:00am in the morning.

I was turning right towards Queens Road behind the USC Boys High school, when a lumbering armored car turned on my left and ran me off the road towards the bridge as he headed in the direction of the Redemptorist Church and turned left towards Mango Ave. What do you do when you encounter such a reckless driver who uses his vehicle almost like a battering ram? Well, all I could do is write down its details. It was an Armored vehicle of Safeguard with body number 1646 with plate no. UNG-791 with another number 725 on its side.

During my days as chairman of CITOM, we took pains to ensure that those armored car drivers are given the proper instructions to assure that they drive responsibly. But even now, they park illegally along areas that are high traffic density and worse, they even park at the wrong side of the road, all because of the ever-present threat of holduppers. But this is no excuse to drive recklessly along the road. If you ask me, the armored cars have replaced the jeepney as Kings of the Road!

I immediately called up the Citom radio control to report this incident and I hope that our friends in the Land Transportation Office (LTO) would do something about such reckless drivers. That driver should not be allowed to drive an Armored vehicle because he endangers the motoring public. I have that old habit of stopping vehicles that does something like this, but I had the presence of mind not to stop that Armored vehicle because they might use this as an excuse to shoot me and say that I was about to rob them.

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