The promulgation of a law prohibiting the use of cellular phones and other driver-distractive things was bound to happen sooner or later. So many accidents had been caused by the distraction of drivers that the passage of Republic Act No. 10913 – better known as the Anti-Distracted Driving Act – could not have come a day sooner.
So prevalent had been the use of cellular phones while driving that the media reported the apprehension of 127 Metro Manila drivers during the new law’s first day of implementation. The brazenness of the apprehended drivers apparently made the apprehensions easy.
The traffic enforcement people released the list of individuals who had been caught operating cellular phones while driving. Clearly, one name was missing from that list. The missing name was that of the President of the Philippines.
If the Presidency of the Philippines may be likened to a motor vehicle, Rodrigo Duterte has been driving it in a distracted manner and therefore should be brought under the provisions of the Anti-Distracted Driving Act.
The person intended to be covered by the new law is unable to do a good job of driving – looking up and down at his cellular phone while traffic lights change and vehicles swirl around him – because he is distracted from the purpose of his being behind the wheel, which is to reach a certain destination. Like that person, President Duterte is a distracted driver.
The destination that a President of the Philippines is mandated to reach is made up of three parts, namely, defense of the nation’s territorial integrity, protection of the citizens’ basic rights and promotion of the nation’s economic development. These three sub-mandates are tall orders; they demand the President’s focus and commitment. Unfortunately, like all the apprehended drivers, Rodrigo Duterte is a violator of the Anti-Distracted Driving Act. The No.1 violator of the new law, in fact.
Rodrigo Duterte is driving the national vehicle distractedly. His big Distraction – with a capital ‘d’ – is, of course, his personal war on illegal drugs. Because of his distracted driving, he has been unable to focus on the defense of the nation’s territorial integrity (he is knuckling under to the Chinese on the West Philippine Sea issue) or the protection of the civil rights of the citizenry (he has created the atmosphere for the extra-judicial killing of thousands of persons suspected of being users or pushers of drugs) or the promotion of the nation’s economic development (he has rejected offers of economic assistance and badmouthed the leaders of this country’s principal trade and investment partners). Like other targets of the Anti-Distracted Driving Act, Rodrigo Duterte, in his own version of being-distracted-while-driving, has not been keeping his eyes fixed on the road while driving the national vehicle.
Distracted driving on the part of ordinary motorists is bad enough – consider the dozens of lives that are lost every day because people insist on texting and talking with their cellular phones while driving – but it is far worse when the person engaged in distracted driving is the Chief Executive of the Republic. The stability, integrity and prosperity of an entire nation – not just of persons – is involved. The new law against distracted driving is applicable to all distracted drivers, whoever they are and whatever vehicles they are driving.
So, stop being distracted, President Duterte. If you continue being distracted by your personal war on illegal drugs, your Presidency will not be the success that all sensible Filipinos hope it will be.
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