CAGAYAN DE ORO CITY – A group of transport cooperatives in this city is set to submit a manifesto to the city government and government agencies here opposing the proposed inclusion of "bao-bao" (tricab) vehicles in Cagayan de Oro’s Local Public Transport Route Plan (LPTRP).
A PUBLIC utility jeepney and a taxi ply Don Apolinar Velez St. in Cagayan de Oro City. (Franck Dick Rosete)
The Consortium of Mindanao Transport Cooperatives (COMINTRANSCO), which operates public utility jeepneys and vehicles, took the initiative after a legislator here spoke about the plan to include the tricab operation in the LPTRP, stressing that they are still illegal to operate.
"They are the ones who are illegal. We are not taking away their livelihood, but we have to follow a legal process. The same with the cooperatives, where we followed the legal process," Melven Erederos, COMINTRANSCO chairperson, told the Manila Bulletin in a mix of English and vernacular on Wednesday, August 23.
Apart from the plan to include tricabs in this city’s public route plan and the tricab drivers’ request to allow them to be used as public transport on national highways, the group is also opposing the tricab's operation on other routes where transport cooperatives operate.
City Councilor Agapito Suan had earlier said that he wrote a letter to the City Mayor’s Office asking to incorporate tricabs in the city’s transportation system by having a route plan, thinking that the local government might have the "autonomy and power" to accommodate them.
"It’s not a product of just a desire for them to operate, but it is a product of need. It is actually a need that during these odd hours we need transportation systems," Suan said in an online program hosted by the City Information Office on August 16.
Suan acknowledged that tricabs are prohibited on national highways under Memorandum Circular No. 2020-036 issued by the Department of Interior and Local Government. But he said they were trying to promote alternative solutions, especially by possibly allowing them outside the national highways.
By incorporating tricab vehicles, the lawmaker said the city’s transportation system would improve, giving the drivers a source of income and providing protection to the residents.
Suan said in the August 16 interview that he still hasn’t received a response from the city’s executive department.
Erederos clarified that they are not opposing the tricab operation as long as they do not operate on national highways and other routes plied by the transport cooperatives.
By doing so, the transportation system would have two-way communication, where the tricabs would be the ones to transport the passengers from their house to the traditional and modernized jeepneys and vice versa, especially for those areas outside of the jeepneys’ route.
However, Armando Villaflor, president of the Bugo-Puerto-Agusan-Tablon-Cugman Tricab Operators and Drivers Association (BPATC-TODA), also expressed his opposition to the setup, saying that it could probably affect their income considering the presence of other transportation vehicles.
Villaflor urged the city government to give them a chance to operate, even just during the night when there are limited transportation vehicles.
"To Mayor (Rolando Uy), I hope his perspective would not just favor those big businesses, for example, the transport (cooperative), but also give us a chance or route in Cagayan de Oro during those times where transportation is unavailable," Villaflor told the Manila Bulletin in the vernacular on Wednesday.
The Manila Bulletin has sought the City Mayor’s Office response to Suan’s letter but it has yet to answer.
Meanwhile, in response to the statement that transportation is not available during the night, Erederos said they are willing to provide a 24-hour operation after the tricabs stop taking passengers during the night.
The COMINTRANSCO’s manifesto is set to be submitted on Thursday, August 24, to the city council’s committee on transportation, the Cagayan de Oro Cooperative Development Council, and the Northern Mindanao regional offices of the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board, Land Transportation Office, and Office of Transport Cooperatives.