The many colors of traffic law enforcement

By Aida Sevilla-Mendoza February 18,2015
AN MMDA traffic enforcer confiscates the license of a bus driver for a traffic violation along Edsa extension in Pasay City.EDWIN BACASMAS

An MMDA traffic enforcer confiscates the license of a bus driver for a traffic violation along Edsa extension in Pasay City. EDWIN BACASMAS

All of us who drive have experienced face-to-face encounters with apprehending traffic law enforcers. Was the experience pleasant or unpleasant? It depends on a lot of things, including the color of the traffic enforcer’s uniform.

In the 16 cities and one municipality (Pateros) that comprise Metro Manila, aka the National Capital Region, traffic enforcers wear a rainbow of colors. It is not clear whether the uniformed personnel you see directing traffic are bona fide members of the Philippine National Police (PNP) or traffic enforcers deputized by the Land Transportation Office (LTO.)

One thing is clear: the Metro Manila Development Authority (MMDA) traffic enforcers can confiscate a driver’s license only if they are authorized to do so by the LTO.

MMDA calls its traffic enforcers “traffic constables,” and these usually wear a light blue long-sleeved shirt, navy blue pants, and a black baseball cap.

MMDA traffic constables are unarmed and are posted along Edsa, C5 and other major thoroughfares in Metro Manila.

SOUTH OF MANILA. Since I live south of Manila, the colors of traffic law enforcement I see most often are those of the Makati Public Safety Authority or Mapsa (yellow short-sleeved shirt, black pants), Makati Parking Authority (Mapa) (darkest blue, almost black long-sleeved shirt and pants, matching Western hat), Pasay City (green long-sleeved shirt, black pants) and Parañaque (orange long-sleeved shirt, black pants).

In general so far, my dealings with the Mapa have been pleasant since Mapa officers are usually efficient and courteous. On the other hand, Mapsa officers have earned a controversial reputation, whether rightly or wrongly.

I remember a story told by a businesswoman friend many years ago when she was driving into the Ayala Center. She beat a red light and was flagged down by a Mapsa officer at the corner.

Since she was already late for an important client meeting, she offered the officer a P100 bill. The man, without even looking at her driver’s license, said: “Ma’am, dalawa po kami. (Ma’am, there are two of us.”)

In fairness to Jojo Binay, who was Makati City mayor at that time, he asked a City Hall reporter to contact me for my friend’s name and the time, date, place of the incident so that he could trace and reprimand the mulcting Mapsa officer. But I had long forgotten these details because I wrote about the incident a few years after it occurred.

YELLOW SHIRT. Then there was the matron who was apprehended by a “yellow shirt” after she turned right while the intersection’s traffic light was red in the Makati central business district. When she surrendered her driver’s license with a P50 bill in it, the apprehending officer said: “Ma’am, nandiyan ang boss ko. (“Ma’am, my boss is nearby.”)

Bribery is wrong, of course, but why do some traffic enforcers ask if there is money hidden inside your driver’s license? Is that a hint?

Motorists who frequently traverse the Paseo de Roxas-Arnaiz Avenue (aka Pasay Road) intersection in Makati may have noticed that more often than not, one or two yellow shirts are on standby in one corner with a parked motorcycle—before, during and after office hours. Maybe it’s because this is what is called an “accident-prone” area?

Yellow shirts are also plentiful at the ground level Ayala Avenue-Edsa intersection, where you turn left from Edsa towards Ayala Avenue. The easier to spot license plates that violate the traffic reduction number coding program, perhaps.

GREEN SHIRT. Meanwhile in Pasay City, at Edsa going north from Roxas Boulevard to Taft Avenue, the left-turn lane has been widened to two lanes. So if you’re driving straight toward Makati, be sure to stay in the middle lanes to avoid being charged with swerving by a “green shirt” once you cross Taft.

“Swerving” can be interpreted in several profitable ways.  On Diosdado Macapagal Boulevard in Pasay City, if you are not on the rightmost lane when you turn right on Buendia Avenue towards Roxas Boulevard, you can be apprehended for swerving by traffic enforcers posted on the island fronting the World Trade Center.

A member of the Automobile Association Philippines (AAP), who asked not to be identified, once complained that the green shirts (Pasay City traffic enforcers) at Edsa apprehend diesel-fueled private cars for alleged smoke-belching, but ignore numerous jeepneys and buses that are the heaviest air polluters.

So what else is new? It appears that traffic enforcers have little or no interest in going after the illegal loading and unloading of passengers, illegal parking, smoke-belching public utility vehicles, overloaded jeepneys, and reckless bus drivers who swerve out of the bus lane, break speed limits and bully other vehicles.

PRIORITIES. Apparently, road safety and smooth traffic flow are not priorities. Many traffic enforcers, in their uniforms of various colors, seem to be more interested in going after number-coding violators—and for obvious reasons.

Small wonder that on Saturdays and Sundays, when number coding is suspended, you will see only a few traffic enforcers on the mean streets of Metro Manila.

Women driving alone, foreign-looking motorists, and expatriates are seen as persons of interest (read: easy prey) by mulcting policemen and traffic enforcers for real or imagined traffic violations.

It’s a good thing that motorists have rights as well as the responsibility to drive safely and obey traffic regulations.  AAP has compiled from National Police Commission Circular No. 89-003 the rights of a motor vehicle driver, and seeks to raise public awareness of these rights.

DRIVER’S RIGHTS. When you are apprehended for a traffic violation, you have the right: 1) to be informed of the full name of the apprehending officer; 2) to inquire from the apprehending officer about which Traffic Enforcement Office he is assigned; 3) to know if the apprehending officer is an officer for traffic direction and control or a deputized traffic enforcer; 4) to be informed of the nature of the violation for which you are being apprehended; 5) not to step down from the vehicle; 6) to contest the apprehension at the appropriate office of the concerned traffic agency when you are not satisfied with the apprehension; and 7) to file the appropriate criminal, civil or administrative case in case of abuse of authority or for any other irregularities which may be committed by the traffic enforcer.

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