BY DOMINIQUE GABRIEL BAÑAGA AND MAE SINGUAY
BACOLOD City – People bound for this city are asking: Is the registration with the Safe, Swift and Smart Passage (S-PaSS) travel management system a requirement?
Not anymore, according to Councilor Cindy Rojas, chairperson of the Action Team on non-overseas Filipino workers, citing Mayor Evelio Leonardia’s Executive Order (EO) No. 53.
“Bacolod travelers – be they returning residents, authorized persons outside residence (APOR), returning overseas Filipinos or visiting Bacolod City – only need to present (coronavirus disease 2019) vaccination cards,” said Rojas.
However, Provincial Administrator Rayfrando Diaz said, “I don’t think the [executive order of Leonardia] (was) legal. I think the [Department of the Interior and Local Government] should check it.”
S-PaSS is an online travel management system of the Department of Science and Technology for domestic travel during this COVID-19 pandemic. It is a platform for individuals to check on prevailing travel policies and requirements in a specific LGU as well as secure travel coordination permits (TCP) and travel pass-through permits (TPP) from local governments.
Diaz said it is not yet advisable to lift the S-PaSS requirement as the city and the province’s alert levels – both under Alert Level 2 – were only temporary and could change every two weeks.
“It is not wise to let our guards down and allow unimpeded travel without protocols,” Diaz stressed.
Under an Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF) resolution, if travelers are expected to commute among the local government units (LGUs), they cannot disregard the protocols of such LGUs they are passing through.
This means that even if a traveler is bound for Bacolod, those arriving via the Bacolod-Silay Airport are still required to submit their documents via the S-PaSS system, according to Diaz.
He pointed out that the airport – located in Silay City – is under the jurisdiction of the provincial government.
“They have to respect and comply with all the (protocols of) LGUs they will pass through,” Diaz said.
Diaz added that when he checked the system, Bacolod’s travel policy is still listed as “Restricted.”
“If they are ‘restricted’ then these things would have to be complied with. If they are ‘unrestricted’ then we would not have any problem approving the permits of all the passengers going to Bacolod City,” Diaz said.
Diaz said if Bacolod does not want to take care of its S-PaSS approval, Negros Occidental is willing to process all S-PaSS applications without delay sans sacrificing the province’s minimum health requirements. They would still require S-PaSS for Bacolod City-bound travelers entering the province via the Bacolod-Silay Airport.
On the other hand, Rojas revealed that 30 Bacolod-bound passengers taking the flight on Friday and Saturday were refused boarding because of not having the S-PaSS.
With this, Rojas appealed to passengers to “bear with the inconvenience because somebody is not listening to reason.”
“For the meantime, all travelers taking air travel, my office is still receiving and approving S-Pass applications,” she added.
Executive Director Em Ang of the Emergency Operations Center-Task Force, meanwhile, brushed off claims made by Diaz with regards to the legality of the non-requirement of the S-Pass./PN
