People occupy any available space in a 'kuliglig' to get around the narrow streets of Divisoria, Manila. (Photo by CANDICE L. REYES)

The urban jungle called Manila has never been so teeming with different breeds of public transportation as today.

Taxicabs have more than doubled in number and mutated into megataxis.

The electric train that debuted in the ’80s now has two sister lines snaking through the metropolis with a fourth line under construction.

And while jeepneys are the undisputed kings of the road as against buses being the lions of EDSA, there are still new modes of transportation that have taken their fair share of the highways.

Enter the “kuliglig” – a peculiar name coined for a peculiar motorized creature of the road.

People describe it as a motorized pedicab and care less about how it got its name for as long as it serves its purpose: The conveyance of passengers and the transport of goods.

For those interested in name games, however, one could assume that the kuliglig, or “cricket” in English, is a name that describes its functionality, likening its ability to squeeze through narrow streets and alleys to insects that penetrate places where big animals cannot go.

But before waxing philosophical, the kuliglig was named simply after the motor brand “Cricket”.

Used to power small fishing boats, irrigation pumps and small generators, the designer of Cricket motors could not have thought it would one day take to the streets of Manila as the heart of a viable means of public transportation in the 21st Century.

Its dominance in the city continues to be more pronounced that many people from different sectors, have mixed emotions about its existence. One can’t help but wonder: Is it a sign of progress and prosperity of the city or another pestilence in the making?

The earliest kuliglig in Divisoria
For 55-year-old Herminio Manual, who has been a trader in Divisoria for 32 years, doing business in the cheap shopping district of Manila will not be complete without the kuliglig on his side.

Manual recalled how he helped his father place all his goods in these mini-transporters. Back then, it looked like a two-wheeled trailer pulled by a two wheeled tractor, while they roam around in the area to sell their items.

“Noong kapanahunan ko, mahahaba pa yang kuliglig tapos gawa pa sa mahabang kahoy. Yan yung ginagamit namin sa tuwing may magbabagsak ng paninda namin dito galing probinsya noong mga 1970's (During my time, the crickets were elongated and made up of a long piece of wood. That is what we used every time goods were delivered here in Divisoria from the province during the 1970’s), he said.

Like Manual, traders and shoppers in Divisoria have always relied on the use of the kuliglig in their everyday business transactions. They trust it for its efficiency in transporting goods and its affordability.

The kuliglig may have been a regular means to transport people and goods in Divisoria as early as the '70s but it was only in 2007 when they began to swarm the entire city. No longer was it a carriage exclusively for smelly veggies and filthy peelings and other trash; it has become a service for students, teachers and office workers along streets with illustrious names as Legarda, Recto and España.

License to drive
Senior Police Officer 4 Oscar Huligang has spent most of his 10 years in Manila’s Traffic Bureau monitoring the movement of the kuliglig within its Divisoria limits. They were supposed to be used only for delivering goods to stores and conveying shoppers and their purchases to the nearest jeepney or bus stops. These were the marching orders of former Mayor Lito Atienza.

If there are kuligligs seen in any of the major roads of Manila at that time, Huligang and the rest of the Manila Police District had the license to apprehend them.

“(The) Kuliglig has proliferated only after Mayor (Alfredo) Lim won the 2007 elections. But before that all you can see in the streets were the usual pedicabs,” Huligang said.

He noted that the number of kuliligs plying in the city doubled after the Manila City Government, under Mayor Lim's administration, created the Manila Tricycle Regulatory Office (MTRO) that sought to monitor not only the operations of the kuligligs but also of tricycles.

He thinks that part of the reason why many former tricycle and pedicab drivers shifted to driving the kuliglig is the fact that they get to earn a minimum of P500 a day.

“Who can earn P500 in a day in a time like this?” says Huligang, who cites many opportunity-driven Manilans venturing into the business of operating or actually driving kuliglig units.

The kuliglig driver
One of those who got interested in owning and operating a kuliglig was Robert Antonio, 18, of Velasquez Street, Tondo.

Antonio, the youngest of five siblings, said he was only 14 when he first saddled up on a kuliglig. It felt comfortable the first time as he was taking on the job his father knew all too well. His father spent his life driving a kuliglig to provide for their family’s needs.

“Gusto ko sanang makapag-aral noon pero wala kaming pera pang-aral kaya nag-simula akong mag pedicab. Nitong huli, nauso na ’yung kuliglig so dito na ako. (I wanted to study but we had no money for that so I started driving a pedicab. Lately, everybody’s been driving the kuliglig so I did the same,” said Antonio, who had finished high school and originally wanted to pursue a college degree.

Now, Antonio admits he had given up on his dream to finishing college. He said that driving a kuliglig earns him more money than he thinks he’d make if he were a regular office employee. He said the shortest ride earns him P60, either it be a special rate for a single passenger or the regular rate of P20 per person for three passengers at a time.

Boosting business
The heyday of the kuliglig in Manila has not only benefitted its drivers but bicycle traders, as well.

Bicycle shops begin sprouting in different areas in Tondo, Manila in the past three years as kuligligs have become more and more in demand in the city. When asked how much money a trader earns from selling motorized pedicab units, one of the drivers at a terminal says between P30,000 and P40,000.

“We cannot deny that the proliferation of kuligligs has helped somehow spur trade and commerce in the city as well as give Manilans available source of livelihood,” Huligang said.

For the part of the Manila City Government, it collects P700 from a kuliglig operator in exchange for a permit. Under this contract, a kuliglig can function as a legal, public utility vehicle in the city.

Accident magnet
Engineer Roel John C. Judilla, a dean at the Mapua Institute of Technology (MIT), said the vehicle is an “accident magnet.”

His assumptions are correct.

Recently, the Manila Police District-Traffic Bureau (MPD-TB) reported a rise in cases of road accidents involving the motorized pedicabs.

Senior Inspector Eduardo Cantong, MPD-TB Administration and Records chief, said there were at least 101 reported accidents involving the kuliglig and tricycles in different parts of Manila in 2009. In 2008, there were 90 and then 65 in 2007.

He noted that the highest number of reported motorized pedicab-related accidents was posted in July 2009 with 14 cases. In November and October of the same year, there were 13 and 12 accidents involving the kuliglig, respectively.

“Most of these cases happened due to their (kuliglig drivers’) own recklessness,” said Cantong who added that many of them are either ignorant of traffic rules or simply daring.

Mr. Butao & Mr. Tong
For kuliglig drivers like Antonio, the only thing that makes earning difficult is the emergence of “Mr. Butao” and “Mr. Tong.”

Drivers who refused to be identified differentiated the two as thus: “Si Mr. Butao, ’yan yung nangongolekta para sa pulis – proteksyon. ‘Yun naman Mr. Tong, tawag namin ’yan sa ano… sa barangay koleksyon niyan (Mr. Butao collects for police protection. Mr. Tong is what we call the… it’s for the village collection).

Asked how often they get scalped of their earnings, an 18-year-old kuliglig driver answers: “Araw-araw ho ‘yan. Iba-ibang tao pinakokolekta nila para raw proteksyon (Everyday. They send different people to collect money. They say it’s for protection).”

Mr. Butao comes every morning, they say, to allegedly collect P20 from each of them. Mr. Tong allegedly takes P10 from them before the day ends. Kuliglig drivers agree it’s too much. “Isang kilong bigas din ho, ‘yun (That’s one kilogram office),” one of them points out, referring to its food equivalent.

“I pity them (kuliglig drivers),” said Zeny Maranan, president of jeepney operators group called 1-Utak, when interviewed over the phone. “They are very gullible that they do not know they are being used,” she said.

Law exempts no one
Engr. Judilla, who once chaired of the Automotive Standards Committee of the Department of Trade and Industry’s Bureau of Product Standards, said the kuliglig lacks the safety features of common vehicles and that the drivers are allowed to operate it even if they are untrained.

“They (kuliglig units) don’t have brake lights, headlights and taillights. Everything is unsafe. Both the vehicle parts and drivers are unsafe,” Judilla said. “It violates the basic principle of mechanical engineering design and material selection. It should be designed by an expert and it should be tested to withstand any form of extreme condition.”

He said the kuliglig does not conform to the standards set by the government and technical community. “The vehicle, passenger and driver will not survive any form of collision. The only form of safety feature it has is the picture of Jesus Christ,” Judilla said.

As law enforcers, Huligang and Cantong said they, too, are confused in implementing traffic laws on the kuliglig, which seems to be governed by its own rules under the permits given to them by the Manila Tricycle Regulatory Office (MTRO) of city hall.

“In the case of Manila, we lack ordinances to saddle them up. It is easy to discipline them only if we have the laws to support us,” Cantong said.

Judilla said agencies like the Department of Transportation and Communications, Land Transportation Office and DTI should be involved in drafting the proper standards for such peculiar road creatures as the kuliglig.