Duterte rules vehicle speed limit to 30 kph

DAVAO CITY—After deadly road accidents and the recent bus fall from an expressway in Manila, Mayor Rodrigo Duterte is applying the brakes on vehicles speeding past the authorized limits in the city’s downtown area and highways.

Life in Davao will have to be in slow motion,” Duterte said in Filipino. “For as long as people’s lives are in jeopardy, the law stays.”

The tough-talking mayor issued an executive order in October, regulating the speed limits of vehicles to 30 kilometers per hour in the crowded city center and to 60 kph in major highways leading to other provinces.

Duterte said the law, which took effect in November, would be strictly enforced to further reduce the number of traffic accidents and loss of lives. “We are doing it for the interest of public safety,” he said on his television program, “Gikan sa Masa, para sa Masa” on Sunday.

Citing the city’s traffic data, Duterte said traffic accidents had decreased by 10 percent and 292 drivers had been apprehended for violating the speed limits.

He again warned abusive and reckless drivers, saying they only “cheapen” the lives of people in the city. “You’re acting as if you own the highway,” he said.

Reacting to complaints of passengers about delays in going to their workplaces because of the regulated road movement, Duterte said: “If you go slow, you save the lives of your fellowmen.” Germelina Lacorte, Inquirer Mindanao