MMDA to pols: Help us tidy up

Metropolitan Manila Development Authority personnel lead the post-election cleanup on F. B. Harrison Street in Pasay City. NIÑO JESUS ORBETA

Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA) Chair Francis Tolentino on Wednesday appealed to both winners and losers to help the agency in the post-election cleanup.

“If it’s possible, please take down your own posters and campaign materials and help us clean up the heaps of trash,” said Tolentino who led the cleanup which started on F. B. Harrison Street in Pasay City.

According to him, the level of noise and visual pollution went up during the campaign period because of the big number of election materials posted in public places on top of the incessant playing of politicians’ campaign jingles.

Tolentino said he was worried that the “electoral garbage” would go straight to estuaries and waterways and cause floods during heavy rains.

So far, the agency has deployed 30 personnel from the Metro Parkway Clearing Group to remove the election posters that had accumulated during the campaign period.

They would be backed up by heavy equipment such as dump trucks, man-lifters and a fire truck.

The post-election cleanup is also aimed at preparing the schools which were used as voting precincts for the opening of classes next month.

Tolentino, meanwhile, lamented that most of the time, candidates leave it to the agency to get rid of their campaign materials after the polls, leaving the MMDA with no choice but to spend some of its funds for the cleanup when this should be the responsibility of the candidates and their political parties.

Because of this, he suggested that candidates be required to post a “performance bond” before the start of the campaign period.

“I will propose that for every poster a candidate puts up, he should remove two after the elections,” the MMDA chief said.

If the candidate fails to do so, the bond will be forfeited in favor of the government or the agency in charge of the post-election cleanup, he added.

“Those winning candidates should not be proclaimed until they have removed their posters and campaign materials,” Tolentino said.

During the 2010 elections, the MMDA collected 15 truckloads of waste, mostly posters, tarpaulins, sample ballots and food containers.

The post-election cleanup may take at least two weeks, according to Tolentino. Afterward, the MMDA will segregate the recyclable from the non-recyclable trash which will be sent directly to the sanitary landfill in Rodriguez, Rizal.

Tolentino noted that huge tarpaulins could be used as roofing for makeshift shelters in case another calamity strikes and leave a lot of people homeless. Other posters may be used as materials in making doormats, he added.