Gov’t ready to meet head-on traffic issue in poll campaign
CEBU CITY, Philippines—The administration coalition is prepared to explain how it has responded to the traffic congestion in Metro Manila should the opposition raise it as an election issue, Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said on Thursday.
“I am sure the opposition is going to raise that but I think the government and the administration will be able to present… an explanation, acknowledging the problem at the same time presenting measures by which we can mitigate it in the short term and address it in the long term,” said Abad, a Liberal Party (LP) stalwart.
The traffic congestion in the metropolis has become a scourge to commuters and motorists alike. President Aquino last week presided over a multiagency meeting to lay out a plan to untangle the mess.
On Tuesday, heavy rains and flooding stranded thousands for hours.
Abad said efforts were being done to solve a “complex” problem that was a combination of the “negligence in the past” and the rapid economic growth which government could hardly “cope with.”
Asked if the traffic mess could become a factor should the LP standard-bearer, Mar Roxas, lose in the 2016 presidential race, Abad said, “I don’t think so.”
“You go to every growing metropolis in any capital of the world and they are confronted with—especially in emerging markets—with these problems. I mean people will understand why there is such congestion happening but of course we cannot simply say that is enough,” Abad said.
“So I think with urgency, the government is doing its best to try to mitigate that problem and find solutions in the very short term.”
Abad said the public should not blame Roxas for the traffic mess.
“All it needs is for the administration to explain where this problem is coming from and what the government is doing to try to make it easier for the public to deal with this phenomenon.”
Told that Vice President Jejomar Binay described the traffic problem as a “crisis,” Abad said that the opposition saw “crisis in everything that the government does.”—Nikko Dizon
