DILG to look into crowding in Zamboanga mall opening

The Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG) on Wednesday said it will investigate the opening of an SM mall in Zamboanga City after a video showed that several mallgoers failed to follow physical distancing measures while entering the establishment.

“We will investigate this incident. Mukhang kung totoo ‘yung video, no, cause we do not know exactly where it happened. Allegedly sa isang mall daw sa Mindanao,” DILG undersecretary Jonathan Malaya said in Mark Salazar’s report on “24 Oras.”

Malaya said that the guards were wrong for not trying to arrange the crowd at the doors.

?“Unang-una, mukhang mali ‘yung galaw nung mga security guards, no, kasi parang hindi puwedeng sa pintuan lang sila magcontrol ng tao. Nakikita natin sa maraming mall sa buong bansa, sa labas pa lang ang pila inaayos na kagaad ang guard,” he said.

“Ang nangyari doon, nagkumpolkumpulan sila doon sa pintuan and they were insisting to come in. So wala na silang magawa. And then eventually pinapasok na lang isla. So nagkaroon ng parang some sort of a stampede,” he added.

The DILG said the local government and the mall operators will be asked to explain.

Meanwhile, Stevan Tan, the SM Malls President, said that they did not make an announcement for the soft opening of the mall on Tuesday.

“We just actually soft-opened yesterday. We did not actually make a grand announcement. We did actually, our tenants, we even discouraged to do any promotions for yesterday para ho makontrol no,” Tan said.

“Reports were given to me na nakapila naman ‘yung mga tao sa labas no and also may grid naman po so kahit na may pila sa labas very observant naman ‘yung mga tao sa city protocol. Definitely may mga tao pero we still ask them to just like here, we have marshalls asking them to follow the social distancing,” he added.