Protect consumers

Not one voice objected to the LTFRB’s draconian decision to suspend the franchise for Don Mariano, the bus company that figured in a number of spectacular and murderous accidents the past few months. When the franchise regulatory board inspected the Don Mariano compound, they found nearly all buses there in violation of one rule or another.

There was agreement the erring bus company delivered substandard service that endangered the riding public. It is the duty of the LTFRB to enforce the conditions by which franchises are granted, promptly withdrawing those franchises if the conditions are not met.

The action taken against Don Mariano should signal the rest of the transport industry, especially those companies running those miserable buses plying the metropolitan area. They should shape up or simply surrender their franchises. The LTFRB should not rest with just this one instance of decisive enforcement.

Other agencies charged with protecting consumers should take LTFRB’s cue. Weak enforcement of standards made our consumers vulnerable to shortchanging or, worse, exposed to hazards.

When a strong quake struck Bohol, the Philippine Iron and Steel Institute (PISI) dispatched a technical team to study the damaged structures — with the exception, of course, of the centuries-old churches that used primitive engineering techniques and understandably buckled. The team arrived at disturbing conclusions. Disproportionally more public structures sustained damage. Nearly all the damaged structures, including bridges, used substandard reinforcement and angle bars in their construction.

The implications of those findings are clear. If there was better enforcement of standards at the agency level and better checks before issuing building permits at the local level, the damage might have been significantly limited. Our building standards, after all, require structures to be able to withstand magnitude-9 quakes. Bohol was hit by a magnitude-7.2 tremor.

When eastern Visayas was hit by Yolanda, the PISI again dispatched technical teams to look at the structural damage. The findings were the same. Large billboards using substandard angle bars twisted in the wind. Public schools used as evacuation centers collapsed, magnifying the death toll. Bridges using substandard reinforcement bars succumbed, cutting off towns from rescue operations.

The steel requirements of Bohol, Samar and Leyte are, presumably, supplied from Cebu. This adds an interesting twist. For years, the Cebu port was a major entry point for smuggled steel products. A steel manufacturer notorious for producing and distributing substandard products is also based in Cebu. That manufacturer should have the blood of quake and typhoon victims on his hands.

A few days ago, the Consumer Protection Group of the DTI conducted several raids on hardware stores reported to be carrying substandard steel products. They were accompanied by technical experts from PISI trained to measure steel products and test for tensile strength.

In two stores along Quirino Highway in Caloocan, the DTI raiding team confiscated over 10,000 pieces of substandard construction materials. The two stores were identified in a subsequent DTI report as Xtreme Unite Steel Inc. and WDL Enterprises. Normally, these products are cut into short pieces on site to prevent them being sold.

Some of the substandard products seized by the DTI had no product markings at all. These are likely products smuggled into our market by unscrupulous traders.

Other confiscated products had product markings but failed the standards tests conducted on them. The DTI identified these products as coming from local manufacturers Continental, Dragon Asia, Cathay Pacific, Mackay and Somico.

Victorino Mario Dimagiba, head of the DTI Consumer Protection Group, pledged to file charges against the erring traders and summon those local manufacturers found to have released substandard construction materials to the market. DTI Secretary Gregory Domingo, for his part, declared his agency will “outright cancel the PS license or ICC certificate of any manufacturer or importer found violating the Consumer Act of the Philippines and the Standards Law.”

It is not easy for an ordinary consumer walking into a hardware store to immediately identify substandard products, especially those that actually bear manufacturer markings. It is important, therefore, for the trade authorities to relentlessly monitor products sold in our markets.

PISI president Roberto Cola says, “these substandard materials are as dangerous to our people as the killer buses whose franchises the LTFRB cancelled.” That seems an indirect way of saying the DTI must act with the same sense of urgency as the LTFRB when the latter agency dealt with the substandard buses.

Consumer protection may not be as “sexy” as other issues that grab the headlines and keep audiences enthralled for days on end. The task requires a steady, relentless grind, policing products sold to our often unsuspecting consumers.

Protecting its citizens, however, is the core responsibility of any state. Protecting consumers is part and parcel of that core responsibility.

When citizens are harmed or killed because substandard construction materials were allowed to be sold, that is as much a responsibility of government as it is of unscrupulous manufacturers who profit unjustly from cheating buyers.