Piston denounces the newly issued DOTr Department Order No. 2025-009 (DO-2025-009), “Guidelines on the Reopening of Applications for Consolidation and Issuance of Provisional Authorities for Unconsolidated Individual Operators,” as yet another measure that places the burden squarely on the backs of small PUV drivers and operators.
While DO-2025-009 purports to offer a “more equitable and just transition” by allowing individual operators to reapply for consolidation into Transport Service Entities (TSEs), it merely extends the same failed framework of forced consolidation that have decimated drivers’ incomes, displaced operators without access to capital, and transferred control of routes to large, politically connected cooperatives and corporations. The mere opportunity to “join an existing TSE” (Section 2.A) or “form a new TSE” (Section 2.B) does nothing to solve the chronic lack of financing, inadequate consultation with affected operators, or the ballooning costs of modernized PUV requirements.
Under Section 3 and 6, unconsolidated operators may obtain one-year Provisional Authorities (PAs) “for the routes they were previously authorized to operate,” provided there is no consolidated TSE on that route. This continues to perpetuate uncertainty, undermining long-term planning, and denying basic livelihood security. Piston rejects this token relief as inadequate: Franchises, not PAs, should be granted on five-year terms, free of onerous fleet requirements that individual operators cannot reasonably meet.
Piston reiterates its long-standing position: the Public Transport Modernization Program (PTMP) must be scrapped. Instead of rebranded consolidation orders, the government must respect and uphold individual operators’ right to freedom of association and redesign a public transport development program anchored on progressive, nationalized, and pro-people principles.
The DO-2025-009 is a rebranded extension of failed consolidation schemes that have left tens of thousands of drivers impoverished and commuters underserved. Piston demands the DOTr to immediately allow all unconsolidated operators to operate, rescind all consolidation quotas, reinstate 5-year franchises, and scrap the entire PTMP. Anything less is a betrayal of public service and an assault on the livelihoods of the nation’s transport workers.