Bench warrant out for 59 erring drivers

CEBU, Philippines -  At least 59 erring drivers of public and private vehicles in Cebu City will be arrested anytime after a bench warrant was issued against them by the court on Thursday.

City Traffic Operations Management operations chief Joy Tumulak said the drivers failed to settle their obligations after they were issued with citation tickets by traffic enforcers.

Judge Monalila Tecson of the Municipal Trial Court in Cities Branch 1 issued the bench warrants against the 59 drivers who violated the Cebu City Ordinance 801 or the Traffic Code of Cebu City.

Tumulak said CITOM filed a complaint against the drivers after they failed to appear before them when they were summoned.

“Ang uban man gud, i-disregard lang kay simple citation tickets lang. After ana, amo silang i-summon to appear and possibly settle the violation and seven days after, mo-file na ‘mi og kaso kon dili gyud mopakita sa opisina,” explained Tumulak.

According to him, they were able to trace some of the erring drivers through social networking site Facebook.

Last June, the same court issued a bench warrant against 29 drivers.

Tumulak said that the filing of the complaints is one way to discipline erring drivers.

“Awhag nato sa mga drivers nga dili paabuton nga mapasakaan og kaso. Kon ma-issue-han gani og citation ticket, dapat moadto sa opisina sa CITOM para matabangan pud nato sila,” he said, adding that drivers should take the issuance of citation tickets seriously.

Some drivers, Tumulak said, settled their violations at the CITOM office. With this, CITOM issued an affidavit of desistance not to continue the filing of complaints against the concerned drivers.

“Pwede man gyud na ma-settle kon mo-adto lang gyud sa opisina basta mabayran na pud nila ang ilang violations, pero depende lang pud gyud sa judge,” Tumulak said.

CITOM has recently filed complaints against 140 drivers before the Land Transportation Office.

“Atong dublihon ang pag-file kay maglisod man gud ta og pangita sa uban. Ang kaning sa LTO, tanan mo-renew man gyud sa ilang license so maalarma gyud sila nga naay complaint against nila ug dili pud sila ka-renew,” Tumulak explained.

From March to August this year, CITOM has filed at least 438 complaints before the court, said Tumulak, although he could not determine the number of cases that have been resolved or not.  (FREEMAN)