FIRING LINE: EV parking rule good, but what else?

FIRING LINE: EV parking rule good, but what else?

By Robert B. Roque Jr | August 27, 2026

The Department of Energy (DOE) is about to roll out its circular requiring building owners to set aside at least 5% of parking slots for EV charging stations. It’s a serious step from the DOE to ensure there is one for every 20; and that, my friends, will definitely boost EV adoption.

From an ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) perspective, such policies clearly push toward cutting our oil addiction and carbon footprint. Fine, I’m not against the spirit of all that. But can we ask for a second, who’s footing this bill? Building owners, obviously?

Somehow, I predict this unfunded mandate in the name of green progress is just the very problem with a government embroiled in so much corruption that it keeps the stance that the private sector has to shoulder it. And that’s what bugs me really.

Perhaps, before we obligate property owners to build charging infrastructure, shouldn’t we first ask the government what charging stations it is building?

And other first questions should be answered, like: Should we obligate every car buyer to prove they actually have a permanent parking space? Because right now our streets are the de facto garage for half of Metro Manila, and nobody’s fixing that.

From first questions, let’s go to a sort of last question that goes beyond parking space: What’s the end-of-life plan for every EV? Shouldn’t EV manufacturers and distributors be required to take back the unit when it dies — before they sell the owner a shiny new one — and fund proper disposal facilities for the batteries and scrap?

Or are we just cheerleading car sales today and leaving the toxic cleanup for 2035? If there’s no end-of-life plan for all that EV junk… respectfully, I don’t think government has any business encouraging EV intake, EV parking and EV charging just yet.

Is Loren’s health the real problem?

Senator Loren Legarda is in France, or is she? Her extended medical leave is apparently a lung condition, according to her friend and colleague Sen. Ping Lacson. He says she called him up and he’s really worried about her condition.

I should feel the same, but the timing is what it is that bugs me. Her leave lines up almost perfectly with the Ombudsman’s preliminary investigation into her and her son, Batangas Rep. Leandro Leviste, over ₱10.44 billion in unpaid obligations tied to “ghost electricity,” which are essentially the solar contracts that his company never delivered.

Lacson says he believes Sen. Legarda’s medical condition, but Assistant Ombudsman Mico Clavano was candid enough to call the timing “suspicious.” Of course, both things can be true, and we’re not judging.

Still, here’s my two centavos, and I hope I could speak directly to Sen. Loren: I don’t think you wanted to drown in your son’s mess. But Leviste is a grown man — old enough to chase a P10-billion franchise, old enough to answer for what he did with it. If you’re still the anti-graft, anti-corruption Loren the public once trusted, you can still prove it. You can stop managing the optics from a hospital abroad and let the son face what the mother spent a career prosecuting in others. That’s not cruelty, Madam Senator, but tough love for you. Maybe that’s what you owe the public — and, frankly, even your son.

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