The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) announced Thursday that its Service Contracting Program will conclude at midnight Friday after fully exhausting its multi-million peso budget.

LTFRB chairperson Vigor Mendoza II disclosed that the final hour of the transport subsidy program will be at 12:59 a.m. on 22 May.

Because the remaining funds have been depleted, the agency will shift its immediate support to a P10-per-liter fuel discount program for transport workers while it requests additional funding from the national government.

Mendoza said the agency is focusing on the fuel discount program because it can no longer afford to pay transport operators under the subsidy setup. He noted that the initial allocation was entirely consumed by the high demand over the past month.

The program ran for five weeks with a total nationwide budget of about P740 million. It covered approximately 15,000 public utility vehicles, including buses, jeepneys, and UV Express units.

The agency estimated that more than five-million passengers benefited from the initiative, which provided fare discounts ranging from 20 to 40 percent.

Mendoza called it the only program in recent years to provide a direct financial benefit to passengers, citing that continuing the subsidies would be ideal because of the positive impact on daily commuters, such as workers and students.