Bet pushes for coop for local transport

CEBU, Philippines – The representative of Coop-NATCCO Partylist has advised transport groups here to organize a cooperative as a way to compete with other transport groups that will enter the picture.

During the 888 Forum yesterday, Criz Paez said a cooperative would enable local transport groups to compete with operators that have financial resources like Jam Transport.

Jam Transport partnered with SM Holdings Inc. formed a corporation, the Metro Rapid  Transport System Inc. (MRSTI), to operates the MyBus, which transport groups here have since opposed.

MRSTI has a pending franchise application before the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board-7 for its 77 hybrid buses. So far, only nine bus units were approved. Pending approval of the 68 remaining buses, LTFRB granted a special permit for another five units of My Bus, which has an existing franchise that travels from Batagas to Cubao.

The said special permit will be valid from December 22, 2015 until March 31, 2016. It would allow five buses to travel from Talisay City to the Mactan Cebu International Airport and vice versa.

Transport leader Ryan Benjamin Yu, general manager of CITRASCO, has questioned the permit.

"Under this law, competition is allowed to improve the transport system and for the benefit of the riding public," Paez said.

"Since this requires a huge amount of investment, my suggestion is, why don’t we cooperativized ownership of a transport cooperative in Cebu and work out with a financing and allow local transport operators within a  timeframe to be able to come up what is good for Cebu?" Paez said.

Paez said that if elected senator, one of his first legislative actions is to ask the Cooperative Development Authority to provide support for the cooperativizing of the transport industry. Paez said this scenario is similar in Singapore, Europe, and United States.

"This is important because we have to consider the convenience of the riding public," he said. – Mitchelle L. Palaubsanon/JMO (FREEMAN)