TRANSPORT group Samahang Manibela Mananakay at Nagkaisang Terminal ng Transportasyon (Manibela) National President Mar Valbuena said the majority of public utility jeepney (PUJ) drivers in the country have yet to receive their Pantawid Pasada subsidy.

Pantawid Pasada is an initiative under the Public Transport Assistance Program that aims to provide relief to the public transport sector from the impact of high fuel prices.

“Actually, it’s still rather empty … but we have other colleagues who have received their fuel subsidies. The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board’s announced that only 50,000 units were downloaded from the Land Bank of the Philippines … but the question is, is there a breakdown on how many [transport operators] can avail of this subsidy?” Manibela National President Mar Valbuena told The Manila Times in Filipino.

“There should be guidelines to be followed, so the second and third owners could receive their cards, because the question is, if they can’t get their cards, where would their subsidies go?” he said. Just like in the past administration, their pronouncement is that 95 percent already got their subsidies, whereas in our data, a lot have not yet received theirs,” he added.

The fuel subsidies for drivers of modern jeepneys and traditional jeepneys are P10,000 and P6,500, respectively.

Valbuena said the P6,500 cash aid for traditional jeepney drivers is not enough.

“I hope the subsidies given by the government are the same, because we consume the same fuel. Because they said the modern jeepneys are economical because they use the Euro4 engine . ... I hope everyone’s the same, because there is already discrimination. Their explanation that those vehicles can take more passengers is simply unacceptable.”

“We’ve seen a total of P10-P15 of oil price hikes over the past weeks. It’s more than the 20 liters that we put into our vehicles every day,” Valbuena added.

He said that what is said in the guidelines that a fare hike is justifiable if the price of oil reaches $80 a barrel is not being followed.