Police and rescuers retrieve bodies of passengers after a bus veered off a mountain road in Bontoc town, Mountain Province, Friday, Feb. 7, 2014. AP FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines — A dangerous precedent for other bus companies.
Survivors and families of those who died in the February 7 Mountain Province bus crash asked the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) to appeal a court order lifting the suspension on a fleet of buses owned by the GV Florida Transport Inc.
Frustrated and angry over the Court of Appeals directive lifting the suspension on 186 GV Florida buses, the survivors and relatives of the 15 victims, including comedian Arvin “Tado” Jimenez,” killed in the crash said that the court order left them feeling that “lives do not matter.”
At a press conference Monday in Quezon City Stella Embile, one of the bus crash survivors, said, “We are speaking now not just as GV Florida bus victims but as representatives of the riding public. We do not want what happened to happen again. Lives were lost. Lives were drastically changed. Let’s not make a senseless, preventable event stay a meaningless thing. We are speaking up because we all deserve better.”
Embile pointed out that as far as they understood as laymen, the bus company’s operation had been suspended by the LTFRB because of irregularities and the poor maintenance of its buses.
“We, survivors and families of the casualties, are already on the road to recovery from our losses, but the sudden lifting of the suspension by the Court of Appeals and with us not seeing any reform on the part of GV Florida angers us. It frustrates us. It brings back all the hurt that we felt. It makes us feel like our lives do not matter. Like lives do not matter,” Embile said.
Mariel Baja, the sister of Gerald Baja who was among the passengers killed in the crash, said that the “good message” delivered by the LTFRB in suspending the GV Florida fleet because of its violations was defeated by the CA order.
“This (suspension lifting) is a dangerous precedent for other bus companies who are violating road safety laws,” she stressed.
Lei Jimenez, wife of comedian Tado, lamented the order and decried the absence of reform in the public land transportation system.
Embile said, “We hope the LTFRB will file a motion for reconsideration or appeal to the highest court. We do not believe that the suspension was a ‘gross and blatant violation of administrative due process.’ And how can there be an ‘absolute absence of violation or wrong committed,’ when people lost their lives because of GV Florida’s negligence.”
Finally, she said, “To the Filipino public, let us put an end to incidents of jeeps and buses falling off ravines and skyways. We do not want what happened to us to happen to you or your loved ones. And we can only stop this from happening again if we remain vigilant as a people, as a nation.”
Asked if the LTFRB would appeal the CA order, agency head Winston Ginez said that they have started studying legal options but have not received a copy of the order lifting the suspension.
On Friday last week, the Court of Appeals 14th division lifted the suspension on a fleet of GV Florida buses ruling that the company was penalized for a “non-existing violation” and that the LTFRB committed grave abuse of discretion in canceling the certificates of public convenience (CPCs) of 186 buses without basis.
It, however, affirmed the cancellation by the LTFRB of the CPCs of Florida buses plying the Mt. Province route, one unit of which figured in the February 7 crash at a ravine in Sitio Paggang, Talubin town where 15 passengers were killed.
RELATED STORIES
CA lifts suspension on Florida bus firm
Father hugged me. I was saved – Florida bus crash survivor