About 17,000 Angkas bikers are at risk of losing their jobs after the government decided to extend the motorcycle taxi pilot implementation for another three months to accommodate new players.

This was asserted on Saturday by George Royeco, chief transport advocate at Angkas, who said downsizing their riders cap is a compromise to the quality of its service.

The three-month extension — from 23 December to 23 March 2020 — of the pilot run will now include two new players — JoyRide and Move It. The decision was to extend the program was made on Friday, 20 December after weeks of deliberations involving the Department of Transportation and the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB), among others.

The inter-agency group decided that from an initial 27,000 riders for the sole provider, Angkas, an overall cap of 39,000 bikers will be allotted for all three providers during the extension.

Each ride-hailing firm will have 10,000 bikers for Metro Manila operations and 3,000 bikers for Metro Cebu operations.

Royeco said, however, that downsizing their riders cap is a compromise to the quality of its service.

“That’s a compromise to the quality of service you can expect, and a direct blow to over 17,000 Filipino families,” Royeca said.

He reiterated that prioritizing the safety of passengers and the welfare of their bikers will be more difficult to do with the new rules. He also asserted that commuters will now find it more difficult to book rides, especially during the yuletide season.

He explained that while Angkas would have liked to increase the number of their bikers, the LTFRB did not allow them due to the ongoing dry run and the entry of competitors.

For his part, spokesman at Lawyers for Commuter Safety and Protection Ariel Inton said the cap limit will be unfair for the Angkas riders who worked hard to have a law regulating the use of motorcycle taxis as an alternative transportation mode in the traffic-choked cities in the country.

Early this year, the House of Representatives passed Resolution 2449 urging the Department of Transportation to implement a pilot program allowing, monitoring, and regulating the operation of duly registered and organized motorcycles-for-hire as an alternative public transport utility.

Daily Tribune sought the response of the Technical Working Group that handles issues pertaining to the motorcycle operating as public transport but the agency has not replied as of press time.