EDITORIAL

Enforcing the ban vs. tricycles to protect lives

THE usual lax and often selective enforcement of laws in the country can be seen in
the enforcement of the law banning tricycles, pedicabs, kuliglig, garong, and other
three-wheeled vehicles on the highway.

Since R.A. 4136 was passed in 2007, no province, town or city government in the
country has invoked the law in spite of series of accidents involving tricycles that
resulted in deaths.

When DILG Sec, Eduardo Anñ o issued a circular reminding governors and mayors to
enforce the ban in 2018, we still see slow-moving tricycles keeping to the center
lanes on widened highways. Clearly, local governments, including the Land
Transportation Office had not bothered to educate and enforce the ban.

The decision, therefore, of Lingayen Mayor Leopoldo Bataoil, himself a former police
director and a lawmaker, to come forward to strictly enforce the ban in his town will
finally create the needed public awareness about the unenforced law. His is a worthy
demonstration of leadership and political will.

We hope all the towns and cities in Pangasinan will see merit in finally enforcing that
law. After all, it’s perhaps the only law that compel tricycle and pedicab drivers to
realize that there is this specific law that regulates their vehicles’ legitimate use of
the highways, and its purpose is to save and protect lives on the highways.

‘Massive flunker’

IT is so brazen of Leni Robredo to brand the government’s anti-drug war as a

“massive failure.” She had stayed only 18 days as co-chair of the agency to contain
the drug menace besetting the country for so long and here she comes, suddenly
championing herself as an expert—in the process unashamedly asserting a
government’s failing grade in the campaign to eradicate, if not minimize, the illegal
drug trade. Where did her data to back up her unsavory allegations come from is a
question strikingly similar to that of “Who killed Ninoy Aquino?” Both have no solid
answers because they emanate from unsolvable-like puzzles disguised as queer-as-
crazy queries.

If there’s a lesson learned from Robredo’s actuations, it is that she seems bent on
disobeying her sworn duty to work in unity with the administration from Day One
that she became vice president. In effect, she has been the “massive flunker” since
July 2016.