THERE seems to be no stopping for Transportation Secretary Vince Dizon who now trains his sight on one of Department of Transportation’s attached agencies – the Land Transportation Office.
Dizon said he would initiate reforms to overhaul LTO’s systems to effectively eliminate fixers, among others.
The planned system overhaul would make driver’s license applications and vehicle registration transactions faster and less vulnerable to corruption, said the DOTr chief who revealed the same plans during a television news channel.
He said he had a conversation with President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. who wanted him to prioritize resolving persistent concerns at LTO.
“The President was just questioning why Filipinos still had to endure long queues or turn to fixers to obtain driver’s licenses and renew licenses or vehicle registrations despite advances in information technology and artificial intelligence.”
The only way to do that is really to fix the systems at LTO, Dizon said, stressing that the continued presence of fixers was unacceptable.
“It’s unacceptable. And I think we’re going to go hard on that in the coming months,” he added.
The top DOTr official reiterated that modernizing the LTO’s processes was necessary to end the illicit activities of fixers, who exploit inefficiencies in government transactions.
He said the government would focus on addressing systemic weaknesses that allow such practices to persist, rather than simply pursuing individual fixers.
Dizon’s remarks come as the transportation department seeks to improve public service delivery and strengthen efforts to combat corruption in agencies under its supervision.
It’s, however, not immediately known if his planned system overhaul would also involve the movement or reshuffle among its key officials from central office down to its regional units.
Dizon returned at DOTr helm after Marcos appointed ex-DOTr secretary Giovanni Lopez to head the Department of Public Works and Highways which the former headed for over a year.
