LET’S BUILD THE REAL FILIPINO CARS!

If we look back into our automotive history, we will remember that we already built two Filipino cars, namely the Sakbayan and the Tamaraw, but we never did recognize them as real Filipino cars, because their engines were imported and foreign made. Meanwhile, Malaysia proceeded to build their Proton cars using Mazda engines, and nobody complained when they presented these as “Malaysian” cars. Fast forward to today, the trend is new going towards electric vehicles, therefore gasoline and diesel engines are no longer needed to build new automobiles. I remember that way back, some skeptics argued that we could not build Filipino cars because we cannot build the engines. We should have done what the Malaysians did, to use foreign engines, but that is irrelevant now. As Filipinos, we no longer have to prove that we could build good car and truck bodies, because we have done that already. Since by now, building engines is no longer a challenge, all we have to do now is to build the electric motors that would be suitable to fit into our locally made car and truck bodies. Who should lead us into this noble venture? Should it be the DOST? The DTI? The DOTR? Or perhaps the DOE? As I see it, this can be a joint effort by all of these agencies, possibly even led by the DOF, because all projects are challenged by financing. Meanwhile, Toyota is reported to be reviving the Tamaraw, and that’s okay too. IKE SENERES/01-15-2024