By NON ALQUITRAN

The Philippine Star

The 15,000-strong National Capital Regional Police Office (NCRPO) will be on heightened alert when various transport groups stage their Metro Manila-wide transport strike Tuesday to protest the rising cost of petroleum products and the traffic citation tickets issued by the national and local governments.

Metro police chief Director Geary Barias believes the transport strike will be peaceful as leaders of various transport groups have pledged not to resort to violence to attain their goal.

"We have a dialogue with rally leaders last Friday and they promised to stage their protest action peacefully," Barias said, adding that he expects no burning of tires and littering of spikes along busy streets in the metropolis.

Barias said the transport strike leaders have called on their members not to coerce or harass fellow drivers who are not joining their protest action. George San Mateo, secretary-general of the militant Pinagkaisang Samahan ng Tsuper at Operaytors Nationwide (PISTON), declared over the weekend that they are "all systems go" on their planned strike.

San Mateo said the "conflicting" citation tickets issued by both the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority and the local government units (LGUs) are "bleeding the drivers of their already dwindling income."

He also alleged that the drivers’ reduced income had been brought about by "high oil prices due to the abusive cartel pricing of the big three oil firms in connivance with the Arroyo (administration) through its stubborn refusal to regulate the local oil prices and industry and its refusal to lift the 12 percent (expanded value added tax) on oil products."

The transport groups described the various local government units’ citation tickets as illegal and called for a single ticketing system in Metro Manila as prescribed by law.

"Since the LGUs started coming out with its own traffic tickets, they subsequently implemented other money-making schemes like mandatory stickers… All these money-making schemes have bred wide-scale corruption on the road," San Mateo said, noting that traffic enforcers apprehend drivers "just to meet their quota and increase their commissions."

Aside from PISTON, other groups that will reportedly join the transport strike are FEJODAP (Federation of Jeepney Operators and Driver’s Association), ACTO (Alliance of Concerned Transport Organizations), ALTODAP (Alliance of Transport Operators and Drivers of the Philippines), MJODA (Makati Jeepney Operators and Drivers’ Association), PASANG-MASDA (Pangkalahatang Sanggunian Manila and Suburbs Drivers Association Nationwide Inc.); bus groups IMBOA (Integrated Metro Bus Operators Association), MMBOA (Metro Manila Bus Operators Association), INTERBOA (Intercity Bus Operators Association) and NEMBOG (Northeast Manila Bus Operators Group); and the Provincial Bus Operators Association of the Philippines (PBOAP), and the Association of Taxi Operators in Metro Manila together with other tricycle and pedicab drivers’ associations.

Barias said they will strictly monitor "trouble spots" in Metro Manila during the transport strike, and secure drivers who choose to continue plying their route.

He pointed out that the transport groups are protesting the LGUs’ ticketing system, which the NCRPO has no role in implementing.

Instead of deploying policemen in the streets, Barias said they will field at least 10 trucks and other police vehicles to ferry stranded commuters to their destinations in various parts of Metro Manila.