By Perfecto T. Raymundo, Jr.
QUEZON CITY — The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) has committed to submit its recommendation on the petitions for fare increase to Department of Transportation (DOTr) Acting Secretary Giovanni Z. Lopez within this week following what it described as successful and fruitful public consultations.
LTFRB Chairperson Atty. Vigor D. Mendoza II has already instructed the concerned agency personnel to start drafting the LTFRB position based on the arguments raised by transport groups in their fare hike petitions, and the result of the public consultations—the recent was held at the Central Office in Quezon City on Wednesday (Nov. 12).
“We will submit our recommendations to our bosses over the weekend. Right now, we are drafting the inputs based on the arguments during the public consultations made for this specific purpose which is the fare increase,” Chairperson Mendoza said.
“The inputs that the transport sectors raised are not actually new. Every time there are petitions for fare increase, the same reasons are being raised so these reasons will be included to what we are going to submit,” he added.
Mendoza earlier directed all LTFRB Regional Directors (RDs) to hold public consultations for fare increase not only for passenger jeepney but also passenger buses and taxis.
In his memorandum, Mendoza said that he expects the result and recommendation of each RDs to be on his table on or before Nov. 14.
Mendoza targets to submit the LTFRB final recommendation to DOTr Acting Secretary Lopez on or before Nov. 17.
“We want this to become nationwide in scope to hear the sentiments of all the concerned stakeholders. In today’s public consultation, it is fruitful since each sector made their inputs to come up with a solution that is acceptable to everybody,” he said.
Mendoza then disclosed that there were recommendations made by some transport groups to ease the burden of the commuters.
“We will echo the recommendations of the transport sector and other stakeholders once we submit ours to our bosses. We will include our position on matters that are within our powers but for the recommendations that are beyond the scope of the LTFRB, we will leave it to the proper authorities,” he said.
The decision on the matter is expected to take time as any petition for fare increase will still be studied by the national government.
Based on the LTFRB data, at least five major transport groups filed a petition for fare increase as high as P5 increase in the first four kilometers, or minimum fare, in 2023 and at least P1 for every succeeding kilometer.
Since 2024, several transport groups covering passenger buses and taxis also filed petitions for fare increase, citing the hardships of coping with the meager income for PUVs against the rising fuel price, maintenance and other operational costs. ###
