Two weeks into his new role, Acting Transportation Secretary Giovanni Lopez decided to ditch the convoy and ride with the masses. What followed was less “field inspection” and more “urban survival training.”
“It was like a war zone,” Lopez confessed in a DZMM radio interview, still reeling from his Monday morning commute. “Isang parusa. Napakahirap. Nakakapagod.” Translation? A punishment. Very hard. Exhausting. And that was before he even clocked in.
Lopez described the scene like a cinematic showdown: commuters lunging for buses, as if it were the last chopper out of Saigon. The bus he finally boarded had a seating capacity of 50, plus room for 10 to 15 standees. But on that fateful ride? At least 90 passengers crammed in like sardines with trust issues.
“You’re not allowed to move. You have to breathe slowly,” he said. “It’s like—just endure this. Just survive.”
In another attempt to board a bus, Lopez was turned away by a commuter clinging to the footboard. “We’re full,” the man said. Lopez backed off, defeated. “I had an 8 a.m. meeting. We had to look for another bus.”
“There was no system. Not enough vehicles,” Lopez said, summing up the chaos with the clarity of someone who’s just been through commuter boot camp. His first-hand ordeal led to a new directive: all DOTr officials must commute at least once a week.
“I want my colleagues to feel it,” Lopez declared. “The reports they’re getting? They’re not the truth. You have to live it to understand it.”
So now, the department tasked with fixing public transport will be riding it—elbows out, breath held, and hopefully, eyes opened. MBI Torque&Power
