Is Barangay Kapitolyo, Pasig City an exclusive … barangay ?

Driving up along Shaw Boulevard coming from C5 Highway, I met heavy traffic several meters before the Old Rizal Provincial Capitol. Being in a hurry, I hastened to take a left turn after a Petron Gas Station intending to take a shortcut through the inner side streets of Barangay Kapitolyo.

But I was met by a security guard-manned entrance gate and the guard informed me that entry is exclusive only to residents with car stickers. I asked since when has this been so, and I was told this particular street was closed to public motorists for several years already. Not wanting to pointlessly argue with the guard, I proceeded along Shaw Blvd. intending to take another left turn further ahead. But even before I could make that left turn, I saw that the street was closed by a high steel fence. I drove on knowing there is another street where I can take the left turn, but that street was also fenced and closed.

So, I began to wonder, is Barangay Kapitolyo an exclusive subdivision, or an exclusive barangay that the residents, or at least someone, was able to close those three public barangay streets.

I checked online and confirmed that Barangay Kapitolyo is really a Barangay of Pasig. As a barangay, it is therefore puzzling why entry to it is exclusive to residents and only to those with car stickers. Thinking I may have missed something, I also checked if Barangay Kapitolyo could somehow be also an exclusive subdivision. But nowhere is it listed as a Pasig subdivision, just a barangay.

I read somewhere that a city or municipal ordinance would be required to legally close a public street. I have no way of immediately confirming this so I first tried asking around. And according to people I talked to, this is how the streets were closed.

At first, the streets were blocked by putting sand, gravel and wood. Then, a sign was posted declaring that it was being “ temporarily closed for repair ‘’. After one or two months, steel fences were put up that closed access to those streets. No further sign or announcement was made about the streets. They were simply closed and no one it seemed bothered to question the street closure.

A similar steel fence was erected along Brixton street near the Pioneer Center, but maybe due to certain business establishments being located farther down that street, the street was not permanently closed as the steel fence was actually of the swinging type, much like a steel gate.

I remember that there was similar controversy several years ago in Paranaque where several subdivisions refused to allow entry for public motorists just passing through. Paranaque motorists were very adamant however because of the heavy traffic situation there. In the end, I believe the right of entry of motorists was eventually upheld.

The case of UP campus also comes to mind where around two or three years ago, several streets that had been open to the public for perhaps decades were suddenly closed to the public. But of course it was government land and a university campus at that, so no one could really question the prerogative of the authorities there to do so, specially in the light of several crimes being committed there specially at night.

Which reminds me of the exclusive Bel-Air Subdivision in Makati which to this day, allow public motorists to drive through their streets as a short cut from JP Rizal street near the City Hall to Jupiter street near Buendia Avenue.

Somehow, one could not really understand why an exclusive subdivision like Bel-Air would allow the public to have access through their private streets but Barangay Kapitolyo would not allow, in fact, fence off the public to prevent them from passing through public barangay roads. One could only guess that maybe someone or some people living in Barangay Kapitolyo feel that they need all the security that they could get. Those people may also feel they need more and more barriers between them and other people. Even if what they are keeping for themselves, the public streets, is not theirs alone.

Martial Law , Massacre, Maguindanao, Macapagal

Gloria Macapagal Arroyo placed the province of Maguindanao under Martial Law by issuing Presidential Decree 1959. Justice Secretary Agnes Devanadera, flanked by police and military generals, and Press Secretary George Remonde, had to repeatedly explain to the gathered mediamen that there was existing rebellion in that province that justified this martial or military rule, though it was not of the shooting kind of rebellion, but rather, of the disobedience to lawful authorities kind, whatever that meant. Known to have come out from the Office of the Government Corporate Counsel, that is, immersed in government corporate lawyering, Devanadera appeared tongue twisted to explain what is rebellion and what constituted this crime.

It was just a few days before that the entire nation and the international community was shocked to learn of the daylight massacre in Maguindanao of over 60 unarmed civilians, including women, 2 lawyers and 30 journalists alleged committed by the political warlord clan of Ampatuan, which is closely allied with Macapagal Arroyo. The strong clamor for quick and decisive justice was banging at the doors of Malacanang and the immediate arrest of alleged mastermind Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. looked headed in the right direction. Still, many voiced that the government was not doing enough. Then, suddenly, Friday evening ( December 4 ) and early Saturday morning, it leaked out that Martial Law was declared in Maguindanao.

That this martial law was declared eleven days after the massacre, and after the arrest of Andal Ampatuan Jr. makes it anti-climactic, to say the least, and outright unnecessary. It was thus easily met with suspicion, maybe a prelude to whitewash the murder cases, as Senator Rodolfo ' Pong ' Biazon warned appearing on TV.

Earlier, ARMM Governor Zaldy Ampatuan, brother of Andal Jr., himself appealed on TV and radio to the President asking that their side be heard. It was the same Governor who handed his brother to the arresting authorities to show cooperation with the government. Then almost immediately after this appeal, govt. forces were shown on TV taking over and blocking entry into the provincial capitol and other local offices, including practically confining the Ampatuans inside their Mansion compound as army troops round the clock manned the entrance gates. And days later, weapons cache supposedly of the Ampatuans were confiscated by the police and military.

Yet, generals of the police and military would support Secretary Devanadera that the provincial offices were all closed to confirm the existence of rebellion, that is, in the form of open disobedience and transfer of allegiance from lawful government authorities. How all these happenings could be mixed up and interpreted as rebellion is certainly a mystery that only Malacanang and its atom-splitting lawyers could divine. But that is something they are well known for, and nobody was really surprised by PD 1959.

Which leaves everybody, looking again at the Supreme Court and the Congress to place everything in right order and reason, if not that, then, just to make things not overly distressful or overly insulting to people's intelligence. So that, yes, after so many tries and failures, these two separate branches of government have another opportunity to convince the Filipino people that the thing we call as Constitution, is not only partially true depending on who is in Malacanang, but is really what it is claimed to be, the supreme law of the land.

In making such a bold and daring proclamation of martial law, the government may have sought to appear decisive and uncompromising in its position to go after the perpetrators of that dastardly and savage crime. However, in this present political climate of distrust and constant maneuvering, in large part due to the administration's questionable motives in many a number of controversial moves and decisions, there was an immediate backlash from many sectors assailing the Martial law declaration.

Gloria Macapagal Arroyo has therefore achieved to add yet another point of similarity with the late dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos. In the same manner, it was then Information Secretary Francisco Tatad that read on TV and informed the nation of the declaration of P.D. 1081 placing the entire Philippines under Martial Law, thus unleashing the military and police on the helpless Filipinos to start years of Marcos rule. This time, 37 years later, it it Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita reading a similar piece of paper on TV to immortalize his place in Philippine history alongside that of Kit Tatad.