Death stalks the Davao-Agusan highway like the proverbial thief in the night.
And unless the Land Transportation and Franchising Regulatory Board turns the van transport system along that route upside down and transforms it into a safe and reliable mode of transportation, the commuters in the region will continue to be at the mercy of speed maniacs anxious to reunite with their Maker.
The trouble is they are not always alone. For as the driver steps on the accelerator and steers the van towards disaster, he takes along with him innocent lives in his rush to show who is faster or who is out of his mind at the wheels.
This is the game of the death currently played out along the stretch of the highway from Davao City northwards to Tagum City and beyond, day in and day out. And had not the Land Transportation and Franchising Regulatory Board step in to staunch the bleeding, there is no telling how many more lives will be imperilled or sent to their untimely deaths as in that June 14 smash-up that left 10 dead and eight others seriously scarred for their rest of their lives.
Yet the LTFRB should not stop there and should not be content with just suspending the operation of the commuter vans. It must go the whole hog in bringing order and sanity to a piece of the transport industry that has terrorized commuters in the region for too long.
For if the LTFRB is merely content in handing out penalties and exacting pledges of good behaviour from operators and drivers, there is no stopping the killing of people by speed maniacs along that stretch. There will be no stopping the hiring of undisciplined and irresponsible drivers who would toy with the lives of their passengers in the manner of people possessed or stoned.
In fact, one estimate says man-induced road accidents have killed probably more people than the dreaded EJKs and natural calamities combined in this region over the first years of this decade.
In its resolution suspending the northbound operation of UV Express, the LTFRB showed various complaints accusing the company of “reckless driving and over speeding, endangering the lives and limbs of the commuting public.” It added it recorded four vehicular accidents involving passengers vans owned by the van service in the Davao region from October 2016 to March 2017.
Yet there is more. In 2011 in Carmen town, three persons died in a three-vehicle smash-up along the highway. The incident occurred when the driver of a motorcycle with three passengers overtook two vehicles but rammed head-on into a Toyota Innova coming from the opposite direction.
In 2015, 11 people were injured when a van slammed into a parked truck along the Davao-Agusan highway in Montevista town, Compostela Valley. Police theorized the driver of the van must have momentarily dozed off.
In the same year, 15 people were seriously injured when two vans collided in Monkayo, Compostela Valley province.
Then provincial police director Sr. Supt. Albert Ignatius Ferro said the driver of the errant vehicle must have momentarily fallen sleep behind the wheel.
In July of the same year, four people were killed and one was injured when a car crashed into a tree along the national highway in Carmen, Davao del Norte. Police chief Insp. Alvin Saguban said the driver must have dozed off behind the wheel. The car was a total wreck.
In February 2016, a town official of Benguet province was killed while 20 others, mostly barangay officials on a Lakbay Aral trip to Tagum when the van they rode spun out of control and crashed into the roadside.
In April, 2017, a visiting cardiologist, Dr. Brigit Amistad Claro,56, of the Baguio General Hospital died when the van she took from Davao City rammed the concreted center island of the highway while approaching Tagum City. 10 of her companions, all medical personnel from Baguio City on a Lakbay Aral trip, incurred injuries.
The police finding: the Hi-Ace van that was supposed to take them to Tagum was traveling at a high speed as it tried to overtake three other vehicles. Instead, it hit the concrete barrier and then flipped on its side, pinning its occupants.
In the June 14 incident, the driver of the Davao-bound van managed to overtake one vehicle but sped straight into a cargo truck, killing the driver and nine of his passengers.
Of course, road accidents are not the monopoly of the Davao-Agusan highway. They are also dime a dozen on that stretch leading to the Bicol region from Quezon province.
They are also commonplace along the Cagayan Valley-Nueva Ecija highway such as the April, 2017 incident when 29 passengers died after an overloaded mini-bus plunged into a ravine in Carranglan town.
They are also commonplace along the MacArthur highway from Central Luzon all the way to the Kennon Road towards Baguio. They are commonplace along the Halsema highway in the skyland of Benguet and Mt. Province where road mishaps have claimed more lives than World War II or the series of natural calamities combined.
Police authorities themselves say most of the incidents occurring in the Cordillera region and Region II can be attributed partly to human error, to mechanical malfunction or to the poor condition of the road.
The Davao-Agusan highway averages four-lane in most stretches and is wider in comparison. It is also concededly regularly maintained.
One culprit is as the locals would call it: ‘kulang ug seminar sa mga driver.’
It may wash. But what if the guy on the wheel has no ‘education’ at all but is a little bit something on the head or is actually a zombie masquerading as commuter van driver?
