By Aileen Refuerzo
Philippine Long Distance Telephone company’s inaction on the city government’s dangling wire correction campaign should be blamed for the loss of connection of more than 1,000 customers recently in Baguio City.
Mayor Benjamin Magalong castigated the company over its half-hearted response to the ongoing program that was meant to fix low-lying, sagging and tangled wires posing danger to the public.
The mayor said the company should be faulted for the loss of connection of hundreds of its customers after a dangling wire operation along Cariño and Legarda Sts. recently.
He said the company had been adequately notified that its presence was needed for the operation as the teams from the Public Order Safety Division and other actively involved telecommunication companies were working on a schedule to finish the work.
However, no team from the company showed up prompting the other teams to continue the operation without them.
Without guidance from the company, the team accidentally cut a fiber optic cable of PLDT mistaking it for a regular copper one causing the loss of connection.
“It was accidental. Had PLDT cooperated, it could have been averted. We were informed that I and the POSD were being blamed by the customers for the disturbance because PLDT men were telling them that I issued the order. That is misplaced. Please know the true story. Don’t fault people who are just doing their job to ensure the safety of the public,” the mayor said.
The mayor said PLDT has the most tangled and problematic lines but ironically it is the least in effort when it comes to the campaign which was supposedly a joint effort among the city, the Benguet Electric Cooperative and the telcos composed of the PLDT, Globe Telecomm, Eastern, Mountainview companies.
He said Globe, Eastern, Mountainview have been consistently working with the city in fixing the problem, showing up on time and working with the same dedication as the POSD enforcers. This is in contrast to the PLDT team which has been “remarkably absent and underperforming.”
“This problem happened because of your own inaction and lack of physical disconnection policy. We launched these operations to help you. We had several meetings and all got were empty promises,” the mayor said.
Irked by the minimal progress of the campaign, the mayor in September issued an ultimatum to public utility companies to overhaul their cabling systems noting the increase in reported incidents involving sagging cables.
When the operations remained slow moving, he tasked the POSD and the barangays to help in the operations of checking and correcting wire systems that do not comply with the established height standards of 16 feet above ground for sidewalks and 18 feet above ground for public roads.
Based on the POSD’s report, it is the PLDT that has the most unsightly, disorderly and problematic cabling system that violate the standards yet it had been the least cooperative. And now it has the gall to pass the blame on us. Please take heart,” the mayor lamented.
He however said this will not affect the aggressive implementation of the program which needs urgency.
“No letup. We will do our best to complete this whether or not you cooperate. We are talking of public safety and nothing is more important than the lives at stake if we do not act to correct the problem now,” the mayor said.
