Life Has Little Value In The Philippines

I was in Manila last week and I was driving along, the car in front of me (I think it was a Pajero) turned left to enter the driveway to his building. As he was turning, a man in a motorcycle went straight and the Pajero hit the guy in the motorcycle.

The guy in the motorcycle was on the ground writhing in pain. I think he may have twisted or broke his ankle. I actually didn't see the incident as it was happening, when I arrived at the spot, the man in the motorcycle was already on the ground.

The driver of the Pajero was obviously mad. That's actually not the end of it. What really caught my attention was, the driver of the Pajero came down from his vehicle walking slowly towards the guy in the motorcycle. I thought he was going to help the guy he hit. Instead, the first thing he did when he came out of his Pajero was to check his bumper to see if there was any scratch!

Not only that, walking slowly towards the guy he hit, the first thing he said was, "ba't bigla kang sumingit!".

Holy shit! I thought to myself. You just just a guy in a tiny motorcycle with a full size SUV, the guy you hit is on the ground writhing in pain which he could have suffered broken bones and the first thing you did was check to see if there's a scratch on your vehicle?

Granted, the guy in the motorcycle may be at fault, but shouldn't the first thing you need to do is find some medical help?

I really do not know who's at fault here, because I didn't see a car coming from the opposite direction that may have blocked the driver's view.

Even if it was the motorcyclist's fault, shouldn't we be valuing lives more than our vehicles?

Here's a photo that I took, the buy in the light blue shirt is the driver of the Pajero. As I was taking the picture, someone blocked the motorcyclist. He's to the left of the motorcycle on the ground blocked by the guy in the white shirt.