Kape kag Isyu: traffick and city hall

21 Sept 13
Hotel del Rio via Sky Cable

Resource person, Kgd. Inday Lee Zulueta, says that majority in the Iloilo City council, this time, backed Mayor Jed Patrick Mabilog’s proposal diverting P4 million of the P8 million from the budget of the Office of Senior Citizens’ Affairs (OSCA) into a “one-time Christmas gift” for senior citizens of Iloilo City.

Kgd. Zulueta: no puppet of Mabilog; has her own independent stands.

“I am not beholden to the mayor, I vote my conscience,” explains the first-time councillor. “I also went against the mayor when I voted to withdraw the council’s authority for the mayor to sign the proposed Iloilo-Guimaras Ferry Terminal.”

Mabilog drew a public furor when he announced his bid to skim half of OSCA’s budget for gift-giving. Kgd. Plaridel Nava questioned calling the realignment of budgeted funds for another purpose “illegal”.

Nava also led the council in withdrawing the local legislature’s authority for the mayor to ink the Iloilo-Guimaras Ferry Terminal project with the private business Double Dragon, Inc. He called the contract, signed October 1, 2012, “onerous and grossly disadvantageous” to the city government. Majority in the council went for Nava.

In going for Mabilog on the issue of giving cash gift of P500 to each senior citizen, Zulueta explains she believe the proposal was legal since the project still fell within the mandate of the OSCA.

Zulueta heads the city council’s committee on children and women and she vows to launch programs down to the village level educating residents on “gender and development” (GAD) to stop abuses against women and children.

“Every day, my office, not just the women’s desks of our PNP stations are visited by mothers complaining they and their children are physically and mentally abused by their male partners,” she reports. “We can stop this better by educating people more than arresting and punishing violators

__________________________________

Kape kag Isyu II
Big Boss Jeff Kafe via Sky Cable

LTO's Gulmatico (2nd from L): seizing drivers' licenses and issuing TOPs are beyond the power of traffic enforcers who are not LTO-deputized.

 

Do traffic enforcers of Iloilo City follow the law by confiscating drivers’ licenses whenever they apprehend one for violating the city traffic ordinance?

No. They are wrong and they are even liable for usurpation of authority, explains Rudito Gulmatico, a regional officer of the Land Transportation Office in Western Visayas.

Only the LTO enforcers and persons it deputized have the authority to confiscate driver’s license during apprehension, adds Gulmatico resource person of Kape kag Isyu today.

“You have to reason out with the officer who is not an LTO deputy; that’s your own risk if you readily surrender your license,” explains Gulmatico, chief of the traffic safety section of the national regulatory office.

It is a common practice among members of the Iloilo City’s Traffic Management and Transport Regulatory Office (TMTRO) to seize the licenses of apprehended drivers.
Only one TMTRO is an LTO deputy, the rest draw their authority from the city government to enforce the local traffic ordinance. 

What if an non-LTO deputized officer seized the driver’s license and issue on its stead a TOP?
Answers Gulmatico: “That’s another act of usurpation. The national law is clear: the power to register vehicles, grant operator’s permit, and issue drivers’ licenses is exclusively vested in the LTO.”

“TOP” means “temporary operator’s permit” which the LTO issues I lieu of a confiscated driver’s license. “It is an operator’s permit, no matter how temporary, which nobody else but the LTO can issue,” adds Gulmatico.

So, if a driver were apprehended in Iloilo City and the same scheme were applied, that is, he/she gets a TOP in lieu of the confiscated driver's license, would that help if he/she got accosted for traffic violation outside Iloilo City.

No, it doesn't, answers Gulmatico: "If you surrndered our driver's license that easy, that's your fault."

What about the practice of Iloilo City to take back official receipts issued to those who paid their fines? asks host Peter Jimenea.

Answers Gulmatico: “What is your proof of payment if you surrender your official receipt?”
Well, that’s how notorious Iloilo City is. A person going to the TMTRO office to pay fine get’s a copy of the receipt after payment. The person receiving payment would instruct him to present the receipt at another window to claim his/her driver’s license.

The final step: the license is returned to the driver minus the official receipt.
Which gives you and me the mischievous thought that some smart alecks at City Hall recycle the receipt for you-know-what-I-mean.