THE House committee on transportation has rejected Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade’s proposed blanket emergency powers after the panel concluded there was no traffic crisis on the air and at sea and that the problem was limited to land traffic.
After 10 marathon hearings, the panel led by Rep. Cesar Sarmiento also dumped Tugade’s proposal to be designated “traffic crisis manager” for three years and left it to President Rodrigo Duterte to name the traffic czar.
The panel also dropped the word “emergency” and approved the consolidated bills titled “Transportation Traffic Act.”
Sarmiento said the panel found that Tugade’s proposal to acquire emergency powers to address land, sea and air traffic had no basis.
He said Tugade and other officials of the Department of Transportation had failed to convince the panel to approve their proposed emergency powers package that was nationwide in scope and covered all modes of transportation.
Based on its findings, Sarmiento said, the panel found that the traffic crisis was limited to land transportation and that the problem was concentrated in Metro Manila, Metro Cebu and Davao City.
“There is no maritime or aviation crisis to speak of. The crisis is not in our ports and airports but on the roads supporting such ports and airports,” Sarmiento said.
“We also found out that the traffic crisis is not all over the Philippines or in some unknown areas. The traffic crisis is in Metro Manila, Metro Cebu and perhaps Davao City. That should have been the first step”•defining the scope of the crisis.
“The Department of Transportation is confused on the specific powers it needs. Most of the powers that you want are either included in your mandate or are already addressed by existing laws.”
Sarmiento said the Transport department failed to present concrete plans and offered instead “palliative measures” under the vast powers it was seeking from Congress.
He said his committee had been the department’s “enabler, even to the point of spoon-feeding” it.
The panel members also called Tugade’s attention for proposing P1.27 trillion worth of projects under the emergency powers package that did not have corresponding funding under the 2017 budget. “As it stands, we have not seen concrete plans that will immediately solve the traffic crisis,” Sarmiento said.