AAP supports harsher penalties for colorum PUV operators

The Automobile Association of the Philippines (AAP) is supporting the  joint administrative order of the Land Transportation Office (LTO) and the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board’s (LTFRB) imposing stiffer fines and harsher penalties on operators of illegal public utility vehicles (PUVs.)

Under the joint administrative order, colorum bus operators will be fined P1 million for the first offense; illegal truck operators, P200,000; colorum vans, P200,000; out-of-line sedans, P120,000; colorum jeepneys, P50,000 and motorcycles used to ferry passengers for a fee, P6,000.

AAP president Gus Lagman said that the revised fines and penalties will deter illegal PUVs from operating and thereby protect the commuting public and all road users, whose safety is put at risk by colorum PUVs. He noted that the G.V. Florida Transport bus that fell off a cliff in the Mt. Province last February, killing 15 passengers and injuring several others, was a colorum bus. The passengers of colorum PUVs are not covered by accident insurance.

Lagman added that in the first quarter of the year, AAP helped the LTFRB implement its “Oplan Snabero” campaign after signing a memorandum of agreement with LTFRB chair Winston Ginez. The campaign goes after PUV drivers refuse to convey passengers to their destination, overcharge, cut trips, use tampered taximeters or commit other franchise violations.

Promoting road safety is the primary advocacy of AAP, the country’s oldest private, nonstock, nonprofit organization of motorists and car owners. As the National Auto Club, AAP spearheads the United Nations Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020 in the Philippines aside from chairing the Philippine chapter of the Global Road Safety Partnership and providing Emergency Roadside Service to its members.