‘Low impact’ transport strike

Drivers affiliated with the militant transport group Piston distribute leaflets to fellow jeepney drivers to persuade them to join their transport strike along Natalio Bacalso street.
CDN PHOTO/LITO TECSON

Not a few of them may have reported to work late, but employees still managed to get a ride from buses whose numbers negated yesterday’s Metro Cebu-wide transport strike.

And traffic remained heavy along the national highway in Mandaue City due to the presence of privately owned cars and and trucks.

While the militant transport group Pinag-isang Samahan nga mga Tsuper at Opereytor Nationwide (Piston) claimed to have paralyzed 80 percent of Metro Cebu’s transportation, transport officials said otherwise.

Feliz Suico of Mandaue City’s command center said the strike affected 30 percent of the city’s transportation while Glenn Antigua, head of the Traffic Enforcement Agency of Mandaue (Team), said paralysis was even less at 15 percent.

Suico said Mandaue City Hall authorized the deployment of five Ceres buses to ferry stranded passengers for a P10 fee per person starting at 6 a.m.

Mario Napule, acting head of Lapu-Lapu’s City Transport Management System (CTMS), said they only felt between 20 to 30 percent transport paralysis.

Stranded passengers were mostly located along the Humay-Humay and Sangi Roads.

In Cebu City, Councilor Dave Tumulak said the strike was not at all felt.

Still, Cebu City Hall deployed 10 buses to help ferry passengers to their destinations starting at 6 a.m.

They halted the operation of buses when the number of commuters started to dwindle at 8 a.m.

“These were the usual passengers but we had them fetched by our buses,” Tumulak, who is deputy mayor for police matters, said.

Disruption was also barely felt in Talisay City and Minglanilla town in southern Cebu.

Passenger jeepneys and mini-buses continued to ferry early morning passengers in the two localities located in the first district of Cebu.

As early as 6 a.m., the Talisay City government also deployed three buses to ferry stranded passengers.

The buses were stationed at the Talisay City Hall grounds, near the Tabunok flyover and at the parking bay of the Gaisano Mall.

Piston members and their sympathizers started to converge in Cebu City streets starting at 4 a.m.

The group dispersed at past 3 p.m. after staging a protest action in front of the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFB-7) office.

Tumulak said he visited the Basak area early in the morning when drivers started to occupy the road to block traffic and asked them to move back.

Another group of 20 drivers gathered near the Butuanon bridge in Mandaue City to convince passing jeepney drivers to join their cause.

Uniformed policemen were deployed to ensure order in the area.

Stranded passengers were seen along United Nations Avenue, SB Cabahug Street in Barangay Centro and near Pacific Mall in Barangay Ibabao in Mandaue City.

Ahmed Cuizon, regional director of LTFRB-7, said the local governments adopted effective contingency measures to negate the transport strike.

Mandaue City Mayor Gabriel Luis Quisumbing said the transport strike affected only 15 percent of the commuters.

But he lamented that the strike affected the regular class schedules of students after he ordered classes to be suspended.

In Lapu-Lapu City, only commuters heading to and out of the city were affected by the transport strike./With Correspondents Michelle Joy L. Padayhag, Dominic Yasay and Norman V. Mendoza