"What the NCAP challenges is not just bad driving—it challenges the very narrative. It says no to the idea that personal convenience should always trump collective order. It says no to the myth that we get ahead by getting around the rules. Of course, many people don’t like it. Because in the short run, the law inconveniences them. Their commute is longer. Their singit is punished. Their individual gain is delayed.
"But what they don’t see—yet—is the long game. That if everyone obeyed the rules, we’d all get home earlier. No gridlocks, no collisions, no arguments in the middle of the road. The NCAP imagines a world where lahat ay sumunod, not out of fear, but out of shared understanding that the common good outweighs the selfish shortcut."
These words, shared by noted criminologist Dr. Raymund Narag on social media, summed up perfectly the biggest argument for the (re)implementation of the No Contact Apprehension Policy (NCAP) along major roads in the National Capital Region.
Granted, there’s a lot to be fixed in the implementation of the NCAP, particularly in the so-called “gray areas” such as giving way to ambulances, or having to cut across traffic to turn into an intersection.
Not to mention that there can be instances where CCTV cameras, which under the policy is now the chief resource for monitoring and detecting traffic violations, can fail to show the whole story when it comes to violations or accidents.
But here’s the thing: the NCAP is not only a big improvement, but an efficient deterrent to what I call the “shortcut” way of life that many Filipino motorists seem to have adopted.
When I say the “shortcut” way of life, I don’t just mean our propensity to look for alternate routes to beat the traffic, which is why traffic apps such as Waze and Google Maps have become so popular here in the Philippines.
What I’m talking about here is our propensity to try to get off the hook when we get caught by “shortcutting” the law.
The thing with NCAP is that you can’t bypass the rules. Instead of paying fines on the spot, offenders will be sent notices of their violations and have them pay their penalties on designated government agencies.
That means no time wasted arguing with traffic enforcers or throwing tantrums on the road (another cause of heavy traffic), no opportunities for bribery and extortion, no more excuses for acting like jerks on the road.
While the NCAP can sound draconian to some sectors, the policy has certainly served to impress on our motorists who have long been used to getting their way (figuratively and literally) their responsibilities as road users.
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