Quit drinking

Egay Uy .

THE Regulatory and Complaint Board (RCB) of the city was recently tasked to come up with recommendations relative to the recently started “anti-tambay” campaign of the authorities. I reckon it was because of the confusion that resulted from the implementation by the Cocpo of the verbal directive from Malacanang.

For lack of guidelines issued to govern the campaign, violations against City Ordinance No. 5133-95 was used as the basis in apprehending those who were found drinking intoxicating beverages in “public plazas, parks, roads, sidewalks and alleys.”  In fact this is just one of the many city ordinances that the Cocpo could use in apprehending violators. There are the anti-littering, anti-smoking, anti-street hawking, and similar other ordinances.

At any rate, the CO 5133-95 makes it “unlawful for any person to drink alcoholic liquor and other intoxicating beverages at public plazas, roads, sidewalks and alleys” in the city and its barangays, “xxxx except on official functions or occasions duly authorized, sanctioned or approved by the barangay council concerned or the city council and/or covered by a special permit” duly issued.

As a result of the hurried implementation by Cocpo, almost 100 individuals were apprehended. This kept the office of the city prosecutor on their toes because of the sheer volume of new cases to attend to as a result of just one day of police operation. According to city prosecutor Charisse Bitoon, her office filed some cases in court, ordered the release of some of those who were apprehended but the cases were still filed later, and ordered the outright dismissal of some complaints.

And there have been complaints raised by those who were apprehended, some or most of which were a result of the lack of clear guidelines that should have governed the campaign.

A question as to “what is a public place” was also raised.  Is drinking along the landing at the entrance of a business establishment covered by the city ordinance?  Is drinking on the parking area of a business establishment covered by the ordinance?  Is the setback required by the building code considered public place?

The phrase “public place has been defined in several ways in various laws and ordinances. As suggested by Director Jane Docallos of the City DILG, we had to come up with an operational definition of the phrase in order to avoid confusions in the implementation of the ordinances.

For the purpose of implementing city ordinances like CO No. 5133-95, the phrase “public place” may therefore be used to refer to all property owned by the government that are accessible to the public (roads, streets, sidewalks, plazas, parks, government offices, playgrounds, sports grounds, etc.), and all privately owned property that are made accessible to the public by reason of business undertaking or by mere tolerance or through repeated use by the nature of such property (subdivision roads and sidewalks, restaurants, watering holes, amusement places), including setbacks and parking areas of building required by the national building code that are in open view to the public, except such privately owned property that are not in open view to the public.

Simply put, to avoid confusion, just quit drinking.