The post consisted of
three pictures taken within the same downtown San Fernando area: 1) a
red-plated service vehicle of the City of San Fernando illegally parked on the
road;
2) the said vehicle blocking a correctly parked black pick-up truck; and
3) three unmindful, smiling traffic marshals literally a spit away from city hall, one of them pointing to the one lensing them.
And captioned thus: ABUSADO SA SAN FERNANDO. May nagpark na CSWD na service sa daan,
hinarangan ang pick-up namin na nasa parking slot. Iniwan yung sasakyan kasi
daw inutusan sya ng boss nya. Yung mga marshals nasa tapat ng may city health
hinayaan lang syang magpark sa daan. Tinuro pa ko ng isang marshal when he saw
me taking a photo. Tapos lumapit, sabi bakit daw ako nagpicture e pinatawag na
nila yung driver. Sabi ko hinayaan nilang magpark dun kaya ko sila pinicturan.
Sabi nya nakabreak daw sila nun.
Pinaghintay pa kami ng pagbalik ng driver ng
CSWD service. Sabi ng guard sa Quirino Yap hardware, lagi daw ginagawa nung
driver na yun yung mag park lang kahit saan. At pinapabayaan naman ng mga
marshal. Mayor EDSA, nganga.
By
Saturday, Aug. 25, the post had over 400 reactions, over 200 comments, and 450
shares.
At
this writing, 7 a.m., Aug. 28, it has generated 624 reactions, 397 comments,
and 739 shares. Of the reactions, 176 bore the emoji for angry while 34 were
for sad. The comments were, but for two, all damning.
Hornet’s nest
The
post stirred a virtual hornet’s nest – with the city traffic marshals at the
receiving end of stinging rebuke, biting sarcasm, harsh denunciation, and
outright damnation from an enraged community.
Aye,
what could only be a long simmering suppressed anger over similarly sordid individual
experiences of the netizens with city traffic marshals now come expressed in an
outburst of collective outrage.
A
number did indeed narrate of unfair treatment received from the marshals –
ticketing them for traffic infractions while letting go of others who did the
same, from helmetless motorcycle riding, to counterflowing, to illegal parking.
May pinapaboran. May
palakasan.
Pag kilala de ede dakpan. Balamu
aku kanita akalingwan namu meg-helmet ning angkas ku dekap dana kami agad. Pero
reng aliwa ku kaagnan a lalabas eda la dikpan ‘gang ela maka helmet
Sobra la kahigpit keng eda
kakilala. Kagad dalang darakpan. Pero nung kakilala dala kahit na patong-patong
pa ing violation mu ala mu karela.
Mga aso-aso kasi mga ‘yan sa
gobyerno pag kabaro nila o mayaman bulag sa patakaran o rules ng gobyerno na
pinapatupad nila.
Aye, the red plate is a
license to abuse, if not a badge of arrogance.
The greater number – in
apparent exasperation – were judgmental. The city traffic marshals generalized
as either clueless laggards and nincompoops or uniformed extortionists.
Ang lalaki ng mga tiyan, alam na this. It can’t get as telling as this on that picture of the
three marshals.
Aww,
if only curses could kill, the traffic marshals would have been deeply buried
in the avalanche of bugok, gago, bolang,
alang marine, kotong, tamad, busog-lagay, animal that the netizens heaped upon them.
Ay,
among the first reactors was one – could be one of the three marshals – that
said I did not know the “real” story, that they were the ones that even looked
for the driver of the service vehicle, and called the uploader “walang utang na loob.”
I
replied that in the first place, they should not have allowed the vehicle to
park on the road, as it was patently illegal. So, his comment was “out of
bounds.”
With
my reply getting an instant thumbs up from IBP-Pampanga president Atty. Gener
Endona, that pro-marshal comment instantly vanished from the thread.
EdSa
Inevitably,
the buck could only stop at Mayor Edwin “EdSa” Santiago. As indeed, a number of
netizens shared the post with the mayor and Vice Mayor Jimmy Lazatin, as well
as with Raffy Tulfo and CLTV 36. Presumably expecting concrete action on the
issue. With Santiago though, I cannot help but presume pa more. And tell the netizens: Asa
ka pa.
Not
a few took the mayor to task for totally discarding the promise of his masa-centered Tsinelas ng EdSa in his first term, and making a mockery of his
current “Fernandino First” program with
the local elite and their lackeys in government as first and foremost in perks,
privileges, if not profligacies.
And
as inevitably, comes that yearning for the days of yore of Mayor Oscar S.
Rodriguez – as some netizens cared to remember – when all was well and in order
in the streets and cleared sidewalks of the city owing to Project Habitat
headed by city attorney Gen. Ramsey Ocampo.
Oca
did it. Why can’t Edsa?
That’s
rather asking for the sweetness of apples in the sourness of lemons.
Meanwhile,
the outrage continues. The numbers on my post still rising.
No comments:
Post a Comment