INDEPENDENT candidate Ronald Rufin on Wednesday batted for free Wifi in every barangays in Cagayan de Oro City. He even said free internet access must be considered as a human right, as Cagay-anons unable to get online.
“We need policymakers to understand that internet access is absolutely essential in the ability of people to be able to participate in society and the economy,” said Rufin to reporters during the Meet the Press at the Cagayan de Oro Press Club.
He said simple Cagay-anons are lack of meaningful ways to influence the much larger players (in any form) shaping their everyday lives.
“If it were lucrative for policymakers in the city to have the free internet access, every barangays would have the free wifi,” according to Rufin.
Rufin said, broadband internet in the country is not great. It is too slow, too expensive, and it is not everywhere, even in urban areas.
He even said that telecommunications providers have been accused of “digital redlining” in cities such as Makati, and Quezon in Luzon and discriminating against low-income and minority communities particularly in the Visayas and Mindanao.
Rufin, who called him “Mr. Free Wifi” said even where there is a decent internet connection, there’s often only one option for a provider, and customers are left to whatever the whims of that provider are.
Rufin, who owned a local radio station, Radio Natin, was among the pioneering who brought in communication and technology in the city.
“He is the one who bring the latest technology of cellular phone repair in Cagayan De Oro way back 2000’s,” posted in Joseph Wong Buerano’s Facebook page.
“The issue of the city’s internet infrastructure has been left in the hands of the private sector,” said Buerano adding that an atypical scenario relative to other services that require vast infrastructure.
Rufin said, the way it works, is that there are fiber optic trunk lines across the country, and from there, other cables branch out.
“Fiber is fast and pretty much limitless in capacity,” said Rufin but it is also expensive to install — especially in the last mile, the final bit of connection to a business or home.
“We’re willing to rebuild a one-year-old road or even asphalted the surface of the new road, but we’re not willing to pay for the internet?,” asked Rufin.
He said, two days after he filed his Certificate of Candidacy (COC) for 2nd District councilor on Oct 8, he was severally interviewed by local reporters regarding his offered to “free wifi” in every barangays.
“It was just surprising for the Oct. 15 City Council's report on the Memorandum of Agreement by the city government to one of the Telco’s subsidiaries for internet services in selected barangays and resettlement sites in the city,” said Rufin.
As stipulated in the MOA, Rufin said instead of providing appropriate space for the poles within the agreed WI-FI sites for the installation of the necessary equipment by the city government, “an space for fiber optic should we put under or on the side of the road.”
Rufin said with the ongoing pandemic, there is really a need for online connectivity not only among students and teachers, professionals and workers but also ordinary Cagay-anons particulary those who are engaged in small businesses and other forms of livelihood in every barangays.
“The current context has made internet access in the city a more urgent issue than ever,” said Rufin.
He said that there are areas in the city where it is geographically difficult and expensive to get residents internet access.
‘But getting the internet to everyone is not just about tech: It’s even more a policy question, one tied up in politics, this I’m now gearing of,” said Rufin. (Ben Balce)
