Macario Gonzaga, director of the Land Transportation Office-Region 12 (Photo courtesy of LTO-12)
GENERAL SANTOS CITY – The Land Transportation Office (LTO) in Region 12 (Soccsksargen) has shifted to the “soft enforcement” of the child car seat law in the wake of the deferment of its full implementation for at least six months.
Macario Gonzaga, LTO-Region 12 director, said Thursday he instructed their field personnel and deputized enforcers to forego the apprehension of violators and instead launch information and education campaigns about the regulation.
He specifically cited the installation of car seats or child restraint system (CRS) in private motor vehicles for children to prevent injury in case of a crash.
Gonzaga acknowledged that there is a need to give owners of private vehicles more time to comply with such measures, which was provided for in Republic Act (RA) 11229 or the Child Safety in Motor Vehicles Act.
The law, which took effect last Feb. 2, provides that children aged 12-years-old and below should not be sitting in the front seat of a private vehicle and must be placed in a CRS unless they can be properly secured by a regular seat belt.
He said the supplies of standard child car seats in the region are currently limited and the available units are quite expensive.
“There’s also a problem with timing because of the Covid-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic,” Gonzaga told reporters.
The official admitted that their enforcers are not yet ready to fully implement the law since most of them are not quite familiar with the standard CRS.
He said they conducted training on the measure for their enforcers last month but they noticed that it was difficult to determine the proper fitting of the CRS based on the available prototypes.
Gonzaga said the six-month deferment, which was declared on Wednesday by the Department of Transportation and the LTO central office, should be enough for those concerned to be aware and properly comply with the measure.
“After that, we will proceed with its strong enforcement, meaning we will start apprehending violators and issue TOPs (temporary operator’s permits) or show-cause orders is applicable,” he said.
Under RA 11229, he said a fine of PHP1,000 is set for the first offense, PHP2,000 for the second offense, and a PHP5,000 fine or one-year suspension of driver’s license for the third and succeeding offenses.
He added that those caught using substandard child car seats may face fines of PHP50,000 and up to a maximum of PHP100,000. (PNA)
