- CHERYL G. CRUZ
Bacolod City Mayor Evelio Leonardia has asked regional director Juan Jovian Ingeniero of the Department of the Interior and Local Government in Western Visayas to direct the Province of Negros Occidental to defer the S-PASS requirement for travelers inbound for Bacolod.
In his letter to Ingeniero dated Nov. 22 and posted on the Bacolod Public Information Office Facebook page this afternoon, Nov. 24, Leonardia said the “difference in the travel documentation requirements has spawned confusion among the constituent-travelers of Bacolod City…especially with the airlines.”
The mayor was referring to the S-PaSS documentation that the provincial government requires for travellers to Negros Occidental, including at the Bacolod-Silay Airport, even if the LGU of destination is Bacolod that no longer requires it.
“There is already a growing number of complaints from residents coming home to Bacolod that they are unable to secure their plane reservations on time because the airlines are still requiring them to submit the S-PaSS per directives from the PNO,” Leonardia said in the letter copy furnished Health Secretary Francisco Duque, chairman of the National Inter-Agency Task Force.
The mayor said the requirement of the S-PaSS in inter-zonal and intra-zonal travel is not covered in the guidelines on the implementation of alert levels system for COVID-19 response.
“We believe that should the PNO impose its own travel restrictions, the same should only apply to its own constituents. This is especially so when Bacolod City, being highly-urbanized, is separate and independent of the PNO,” he added.
Leonardia stressed that the Bacolod-Silay Airport is regulated by the national government. “As such, the PNO cannot claim to also impose its own EO against those travellers inbound for Bacolod.”
The City said in a press release Nov. 24 that the Philippine Airlines has apparently submitted to what passengers described as the “whims” of Provincial Administrator Rayfrando Diaz II and the Negros Occidental government for insisting that an S-PaSS (Safe, Swift and Smart Passage) is required when Bacolod-bound travelers land at the Bacolod-Silay Airport.
In its policy directed at passengers going to Bacolod, PAL advised them to fill out as their address “Barangay Airport, Silay City” to comply with the Capitol order, the press release said.
Bacolod Emergency Operations Center-Task Force executive director Em Legaspi-Ang said “the PAL memo, which many called a ‘joke’, is tantamount to instructing inbound travelers to lie by supplying fake or false information on an official government platform.”
“Sadly, it leaves a bad taste on the mouth,” Ang added. — CGC
