Civic group says Subic joint project overdue

MANILA, Philippines - The Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) has come under fire from a civic group for “unnecessary dilly-dallying in the face of a valuable opportunity for the expansion and development of its port facilities”.

According to the Tanglaw ng Bayan, the SBMA “appears to have been cowed by the incessant threats of businessmen whose performance at Subic is now being scrutinized in the light of a joint venture proposal k by the Harbor Center Port Terminal, Inc. (HCPTI)”.

HCPTI submitted last year a proposal for a joint venture with SBMA for the management and development of the latter’s bulk and break-bulk terminals. Under the HCPTI proposal, the firm commits to pour in some P200 million for the expansion and development of bulk and break-bulk terminals in the facility. In addition, the joint venture guarantees SBMA a fixed minimum revenue of $32 million over a period of 25 years plus 15 to 20 percent in annual revenue share from port operations.

Professor and civic leader Bayani Santos Jr., Tanglaw spokesman, said the joint venture “looks like a long overdue scheme that the SBMA should have thought of many years ago”. This mode would have allowed SBMA to expand and improve its facilities without spending a single centavos, he explained.

“We wonder why it had to take an HCPTI proposal for SBMA to realize that it has been losing vast opportunities over the years,” Santos said. And now that the opportunity is here, the SBMA seems to be getting cold feet, he added.

Santos said the SBMA should “just go ahead, sign the joint venture and let adversarial parties air the grievances in the proper administrative or judicial venue”. But the SBMA should not succumb to the apparent intimidation being done through media by parties who do not want to see the venture push through, he added.

If the SBMA is confident that the unsolicited proposal-Swiss challenge process through which the HCPTI project has gone through its transparent and above-board, then it should go ahead, he added.

Santos warned that “delaying the joint venture means significant opportunity losses to SBMA and the government.”