Lawyer Mae Elaine Bathan, the chief of staff of Mandaue City Mayor Luigi Quisumbing, paid a fine of P500 on Tuesday for a traffic violation which she committed the other day.
Bathan was issued a traffic citation ticket for “disregard of the traffic lane” while traversing D. M. Cortes Avenue on Tuesday morning.
“Even the Chief of Staff of the Mayor, Atty. Elaine Bathan, is not exempted from being apprehended due to traffic violations in Mandaue City. Just in today, she pays her fine at the City Treasurer’s Office,” said a Facebook post by the Mandaue City Treasurer’s Office (MCTO).
Bathan visited MCTO around 11 a.m. to pay her P500 fine.
Camelo Cobarde Jr., traffic enforcer of Traffic Enforcement Agency of Mandaue (TEAM), told Cebu Daily News that he flagged down a vehicle which he saw was already stepping on the pedestrian lane while people were crossing the road near the corner the Seamen’s Hospital in Barangay Umapad.
Unaware that the driver was Bathan, Cobarde said, he signaled the car driver to move her vehicle to the roadside so he could issue her with a citation ticket.
It was only when Bathan opened her car window when he recognized who the driver was.
Cobarde said he tried to apologize to Bathan but the lady lawyer told him to continue what he was doing.
Bathan had also told him that she understood that he was only doing his job, Cobarde added.