Citing autonomy, UP officials dodge fire probes
By KIM ARVEEN PATRIA and FIDEL MAXIMO DIEGO III
(NOTE: This article was written in October 2010, for an investigative journalism class under Prof. Yvonne Chua. I am publishing it here after the fire that hit UP CASAA. Photo by Joshua Mark Dalupang.)
“A spoiled brat” is how a fire official describes the University of the Philippines Diliman for refusing to cooperate with investigations on recent fire incidents that struck the state university’s main campus in Quezon City.
“They are not recognizing the authority of the Fire Department yet they call us when there is fire. There is irony in this situation,” said Alma Abacahin, chief of the Intelligence and Investigation Section of the Quezon City Fire Department (QCFD).
Abacahin said that after a fire hit Quezon Hall, UP’s central administrative building, on 16 August 2010, she sent a letter asking for documents required for the conduct of any fire probe.
The documents listed in the letter — affidavits of loss, fire safety inspection certificates, building permits and electrical inspection certificates, among others — should have been submitted to the QCFD within a week after receipt of the notice.
On 6 September 2010, however, Abacahin received a response from the Office of the Campus Architect (OCA), which acts as the building official of the 483-hectare campus, saying that the university has no copy of the permits and certificates they needed.
“All buildings inside the UP Diliman campus were exempted from annual inspection being implemented by local government,” the letter said.
NO JURISDICTION
Claiming that the university enjoys autonomy, the letter further stated that local fire officials “have lost jurisdiction to inspect buildings and implement memoranda emanating from their office.”
Abacahin cried foul, saying that the act of obstructing the QCFD from investigating fire incidents is in violation of Republic Act No. 9514, also known as the Revised Fire Code of the Philippines.
Section 5 of the law authorizes the Bureau of Fire Protection (BFP), under which the QCFD operates, to “inspect at reasonable time, any building, structure, installation or premises for dangerous or hazardous conditions or materials.”
Under the Fire Code, the BFP may also require building owners or occupants to submit pertinent documents pertaining to the fire safety of buildings “to ensure compliance with applicable codes and standards.”
In a memorandum dated 15 September 2010, Abacahin asked the BFP regional office whether UP Diliman is exempted from the provisions of the Revised Fire Code. The BFP regional legal officer, however, has yet released a response.
Abacahin said she is willing to exhaust all judicial means to force UP’s cooperation, saying that she no longer wants to leave their work hanging. Scanning their archives, Abacahin noted that most of the fire investigations in UP are incomplete.
“We have not closed a single case in UP,” Abacahin said. “UP would probably be charged with negligence if we finish our reports,” she added.
MISCOMMUNICATION?
UP Diliman has never requested fire inspections, Rodolfo Espina, a QCFD senior fire officer, claimed in a phone interview when asked for copies of reports of recent fire inspections in the campus.
Abacahin believes UP officials are guilty not only by omission, but because they have expressly prohibited fire inspections. She cited the case of Romulo de la Merced, also a senior fire officer, who was questioned to the OCA after he tried to inspect the UP Theatre.
A UP Diliman official, however, denied that they are prohibiting fire investigations in the campus, saying that they simply want the QCFD to give prior notice to concerned university authorities before appearing on site.
Cynthia Grace Gregorio, UP Diliman vice chancellor for community affairs, said she thinks the OCA only wished to be properly informed so personnel could be sent to assist fire inspectors.
“It could have been a simply case of miscommunication,” Gregorio said. “If they took that negatively, that would be unfortunate.” The statement that university officials are uncooperative is “debatable” and “grossly unfair”, she said, adding that the QCFD has not yet even attempted to reach her office.
It was Gregorio’s name that appeared as signatory in the letter sent to Abacahin, saying that the QCFD has no jurisdiction over UP Diliman. But she said an officer in-charge signed the letter for her.
The letter only asked the QCFD to “respect the autonomy of the university,” Grogorio said, citing as basis the existing agreement between UP, the Department of Defense and the Philippine National Police, limiting military and police presence within the campus.
Gregorio admitted, however, that she is not aware if UP is under any similar agreement with the BFP. She said the university’s autonomy is based on Republic Act No. 9500, dubbed as the New UP Charter.
NOT EXEMPTED
But according to the UP Legal Office, autonomy in the UP charter is limited to “a mandated ability to control over its fiscal administration.
“[UP] maintains its public character (and is) therefore subject to the legislative mandate of the Revised Fire Code,” the UP Legal Office said, adding that autonomy cannot be used as an excuse to prevent the BFP from fulfilling its functions.
“It is for the benefit of the public interest that compliance with the law be fulfilled and it is the responsibility of the UP administration to determine its culpability in light of the recent incidents of fires in the campus,” they said in an email.
The UP Legal Office also suggested three possible courses of action QCFD can take. One is to present their case to the Board of Regents, the highest policy-making body in UP
Another remedy would be the special civil action of mandamus, wherein fire officials would have to prove that coordinating with the BFP is UP’s ministerial duty.
Finally, and “at best, they could file administrative charges before the Ombudsman, for gross misconduct or dereliction of duty,” the UP Legal Office said through email.
Still, Gregorio hopes that they will be able to sort the issues raised by the QCFD, saying that it would favor the university if local fire officials would be able to inspect buildings in the campus.
She recalled a past arrangement with the QCFD wherein she offered the old UP fire station as a satellite post for local firefighters. “We would have to depend on local officials. We don’t have fire trucks, just to give you an idea,” Gregorio noted.
SHARED RESPONSIBILITY
Johannes Chua of the OCA, which operates under Gregorio’s Office of the Vice Chancellor for Community Affairs (OVCCA), has the same opinion. “[E]veryone’s involved when it comes to safety, including maintenance, building administrators, the administration and even local government,” he said.
Conceding that fire safety starts with the structure’s design, Chua argued that his office follows standards in the Fire Code when it plans buildings. He added that contractors must also secure permits from the Quezon City government before construction.
When buildings are handed over to end-users — building administrators and occupants, primarily — the campus architect provides manuals or guidelines for fire safety.
“It’s more on common sense. It’s mostly the upkeep of the fire protection system, ensuring that the fire exits are always open, no obstructions [to] egresses in preparation for fires, things like that,” Chua explained.
However, he confessed that they rely mostly on occupants to maintain fire safety, adding that part of the inspection must be done by the Campus Maintenance Office (CMO), which also works under the OVCCA.
“What we basically do is design. I think since we do a lot, admittedly, maybe we don’t do [inspections] as often,” he added.
Chua said buildings in UP Diliman are being rewied. The project started in the 90s, but Chua said they were only able to rewire Palma Hall but not the pavilions, including the Chemistry Pavilion, which was razed by a fire in early June.
The campus architect was also unsure whether the Quezon Hall wing that burned in August has been rewired. “I would have to ask our electrical engineer,” Chua hesitated. He said they recently hired a new engineer following the previous one’s resignation.
FINGER-POINTING
But Chua thinks the electrical engineer is not solely responsible for ensuring safety of electrical wiring. “He can’t do it all by himself. We do also rely on the CMO in terms of problems. Building administrators report it to them first and they forward it to us,” he added.
Alden Jose Aynera, officer in-charge of the CMO, thinks otherwise, saying that the OCA must be the one to make such recommendations since they have the expertise.
“We have, maybe, the best electricians but these electricians are not engineers. And who could say that the system or the electrical system of the building is safe? Definitely, it’s not the electrician, it’s the engineer,” Aynera said.
He said that most of his electricians learned by experience. “Mga nakuryente na ang mga ‘yan kaya alam nila kung kelan ako sasabihan na, ‘Sir, puputok, ‘yan!’” Aynera said in jest. When he gets such reports, he forwards it to the OCA.
Aynera knows it takes time for an engineer to study the buildings in UP and that the continuous turnover of the electrical engineering post gives rise to discontinuity in the OCA’s operation.
“When you are new in the position, the first thing you have to do is to read all the plans for you to know that this has been rewired or that the other building was not. And reading all of those plans would not take a single day,” Aynera said.
REPAIRS, RENOVATIONS
Based on reports he receives from his personnel, Aynera agrees that some buildings need to be rewired. He refused to name the buildings, however, and only said that buildings built in the 50s or 60s will have to be prioritized.
Aside from maintaining electrical systems, Aynera said that other major repairs and renovations are also not their responsibility but rather that of the OCA.
“If the repairs are only minor, we will do it,” he said. “But when we talk about renovation it’s out of our hands since it has to be bid out to contractors. The OCA is most capable of doing that.”
Aynera also admitted that the CMO suffers from lack of manpower. He said that about 160 non-professionals maintains the 161 buildings in the campus. Aynera added that their productivity is limited since the average working age in the CMO is 52.
“A person who is 37 year old or younger and a person who is over 40 have different production rates. Some of my employees could produce eight man hours; others, maybe two,” he explained.
‘LEAVE IT TO THE EXPERTS’
Aynera acknowledged that they probably fall short in what he calls “predictive and preventive maintenance.” But he said it is not entirely their fault, citing lack of resources as a critical factor.
Despite the problems he sees in his office and the OCA, Aynera thinks both have no responsibility in the recent fire incidents on campus. He said they had no control over the situation, which he thinks is isolated. “To say that we are responsible wouldn’t be right,” Aynera explained.
Unaware that UP and QCFD are debating over the latter’s jurisdiction over buildings in the campus, Aynera said: “Let’s leave it to the experts. Who are the experts? The Bureau of Fire Protection; we leave it to the arson investigators.”
