An Interagency Council on Traffic (IACT) team will be deployed on the streets of Metro Cebu starting tomorrow, July 14, to apprehend erring motorists.
Land Transportation Office in Central Visayas (LTO-7) Regional Director Victor Emmanuel Caindec said intelligence personnel from the agency were sent out in the past few days to inspect the areas where the IACT team would be most needed when they begin their operation tomorrow.
IACT is a national task force composed of retired officials from the military and police service and personnel from the LTO Central Office, Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB), Department of Transportation (DOTr), Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), and the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) among others.
“We are depoliticizing our actions that is why we are asking IACT and the DOTr to go to our general area of responsibility and start implementing the law. They will be the one to do the apprehensions so we won’t be accused of politicizing,” said Caindec.
Caindec recently got into a spat with Cebu City Mayor Tomas Osmeña after he announced that many local government units in Cebu have vehicles that have expired registrations, including 156 vehicles owned by Cebu City.
The IACT team members, Caindec said, “are very effective people.”
“These are retired officials of the military and police services and they are fearless in apprehending. The don’t make any distinction,” added Caindec. “In fact, an IACT team have been operating in Bohol silently. IACt has been very effective in apprehending road safety violators there.”
On Thursday, Caindec also warned LGUs to remove sirens, dome lights and blinkers mounted in government-owned vehicles if these were not officially declared and approved by the LTO as emergency vehicles.
Caindec said President Rodrigo Duterte has given the Philippine National Police (PNP) a directive to aggressively go after vehicles, especially those owned by the government, that violate traffic laws.