Circulating now on social media is a video taken from inside a moving train of the Light Rail Transit 1 running from Central Station to Pedro Gil with its doors open.
The Facebook user who uploaded the video said the train continued to run fast, posing extra danger to the passengers.
Earlier this week we also saw photos of the extremely long lines of people wanting to take the Metro Rail Transit 3. While long queues are not altogether foreign to metro commuters, this episode was unprecedented because the line actually reached the grounds of Edsa, where it intersects with West Avenue, and then snaked up the footbridge used by people crossing the intersection.
On Friday, too, some rail trouble prompted the service to stop, limiting the serviced stations to just between Shaw and Taft Avenue.
That none of these are new does not ease our indignation that this administration actually made things worse for the ordinary commuter who must allot precious hours—not to mention energy and sanity—going to and from the workplace.
Lo and behold, the secretary of Transportation and Communications, on whose shoulders the burden of the deterioration of our mass transport system lies, has the gall to remind us that people deserve better services from the government.
“Will the people be happy? Not yet. It’s their right to demand better services, get impatient, and ask for better services from the DoTC,” said Joseph Emilio Abaya during an administration sortie in Cavite this week.
Funny that he should tell the people it is within their rights to demand better services, as though we are not already doing that. This man, who once reminded us that traffic is not fatal, should be ashamed of himself: not only did his department fail to improve the transport system, it actually made it worse.
We count the days until this set of administrators pack their bags and leave their offices second half of the year. For all their self-righteous talk, they have done little to assure the people that they have our best interests in mind.
The person who uploaded the LRT video said he was ashamed because there were foreign students who were on that trip. We say there is no need to have foreigners around for us to realize the shame in the situation—a government that makes life difficult for its workers who toil everyday to eke out a decent living.
Abaya and his boss, the President, must be sentenced to taking public transportation every day for the remainder of their terms. We will then have the satisfaction of telling them, when they do complain, “you’re still alive, aren’t you?”
