Senator Grace Poe. (PHOTO FROM SEN. GRACE POE’S OFFICE)
Following the Supreme Court’s lifting of its temporary restraining order (TRO) on car plates, the government should now “end the plate-less era in a fast and furious manner,” Senator Grace Poe said on Wednesday.
“I would like to echo what millions of owners of vehicles with temporary, handwritten license plates want government to do: Please step on the gas,” she said.
“They have long paid for these plates. It is time to deliver them,” Poe added, even noting that the delay in the issuance is now “as long as the period of World War II was fought in the Philippines.”
“Mahirap tanggapin ang paliwanag na aabutin ng kalahating dekada ang pag-isyu nang wala pang isang kilong bigat na plaka kung wala pang isang linggo ang tagal ng pag-assemble ng dalawang toneladang sasakyan,” Poe said.
(It is hard to accept the explanation that it would take half a decade to issue a plate that does not even weigh half a kilo if a of a two-ton car does not even take a week to assemble.)
The lady legislator said that while “a myriad of legal and budgeting concerns must be threshed out” to restart the plate procurement process, “perhaps other legal ways can be explored to fast track the delivery of these plates.”
“Yung the usual dahilan kung bakit delayed ang plaka ay parang sirang plaka na ating naririnig,” Poe said.
(That is the usual problem why we hear that the delayed plates like a broken record.)
The senator noted that the car and motorcycle plates covered by the injunction, “even if they are fully released will hardly make a dent on the demand.”
“There were two million motorcycles sold over the past two years. Car sales from 2016 to 2017 totaled almost 800,000. Hindi pa kasama yung mga luma, kasi lahat ay covered by that ill-advised plate replacement program,” Poe pointed out.
(The old ones are not year included because all plates are covered by that ill-advised plate replacement program.)
Poe asserted that the government must provide the public a road map and timetable on the delivery of the long-overdue plates.
“The program should be like Waze—it should include the scheduled date of arrival and the route,” she said. /kga