Right of way

Everyone is complaining about our country’s inadequate public infrastructure and cite it as one reason why our economy struggles the way it does. Administrations have come and gone announcing ambitious infrastructure programs, calling them flagship projects. But projects are delayed for 10 years or more because of right-of-way (ROW) problems.

I had a long conversation with officials of the National Grid Corporation of the Philippines (NGCP) last Friday. While they admitted delays in many of their projects, they blamed it on ROW problems and the laborious permitting process at the LGU level. In fairness to them, I think they have a valid complaint.

San Miguel Corporation was delayed a number of years constructing that expressway from Makati to Balintawak due to ROW problems. I remember talking with Mark Dumol who also complained about ROW problems delaying the completion of TPLEX. The MRT 7 was also delayed a number of years due to ROW problems.

Ramon S. Ang got so impatient with the failure of the government to secure the ROW for the Makati-Balintawak link that he advanced the payment sought by the lot owners and bahala na if the government reimburses him. Same thing happened at TPLEX. To RSA, he puts public convenience ahead even as he says things shouldn’t be this difficult if everyone thinks of public interest first. It is the government’s obligation to expropriate for ROW.

There is a law that says priority infrastructure projects only need to deposit with the court the payment for ROW and the property can be immediately taken over. Cynthia Perez-Alabanza, the lawyer handling public and government affairs at NGCP laughed when I said that. She said that’s what they learn in law school, but the reality on the ground is vastly different.

She cited her personal experience working on ROW and LGU permits for the Hermosa–San Jose 500 kV Transmission Line Project. This is a very vital project because it provides the “highway” from the power plants in Bataan to the main grid. Given how thin our power reserves are, it is tragic to have power plants in Bataan stranded due to congestion on the existing line.

Expropriation is the power of the government to acquire private land for public purpose or use without the consent of the owner upon payment of just compensation. It is a critical tool for governments to develop necessary infrastructure, such as roads and power stations, for economic growth. So, private ownership of land gives way for the overall public benefit.

But that’s not how landowners, especially in the provinces feel. They use all the influence they have on the LGU and the local courts to delay ROW acquisition. They even use the time caused by their delaying tactics to build on the land to frustrate the ROW acquisition or make it more expensive. Such lack of patriotism… a reason why our country is in such dire economic situation today.

Take that P10.2 billion Hermosa-San Jose line. NGCP filed an application on Dec. 11, 2015 for that and other capex projects with the ERC. NGCP received provisional authority to proceed almost a year later on Aug. 24, 2016. NGCP started the process of acquiring ROW for the line project in January 2017 and only completed everything in February this year. The new line was energized the other week.

Initially, only 230 towers were needed. But NGCP couldn’t build on a straight line, which is the logical way, and had to zigzag to avoid properties of influential landowners. This caused delays and increased the number of tower sites to 256. The additional 26 towers at P25 million each boosted expenses by an additional P650 million. Imagine how many schoolhouses that could have built.

Here is the building permit timeline: October 2022- 187/256 secured; November 2022- 203/256 secured; December 2022- 233/256 secured; January 2023- 256/256 secured.

The LGUs, up to the barangays, made it difficult to secure building permits with a long list of requirements that kept on getting longer. The attitude is, mayaman naman yung NGCP, gatasan natin. But it is not the NGCP shareholders who pay in the end, but everyone who uses electricity.

NGCP cited other factors that caused delays: 1) Filing of expropriation cases took a hiatus during the ECQ imposed in 2020. 2) Courts in Bulacan refused to accept provisional deposits unless an order is issued by the court, and only after service of summons. 3) In some cases where summons have to be served by publication, the period for deposit of provisional value further lengthened.

Since the Hermosa-San Jose line is very important, the Department of Energy should have stepped in and worked with the Department of Local Governments and the Department of Justice to expedite matters. Congratulations to the Supreme Court for granting the request to assign a special RTC to handle all ROW cases.

Al Cusi, Duterte’s Energy Secretary, a politician, should have used his skills to coordinate efforts that should have sped up issuance of building permits and getting ROW, but he was too busy playing politics.

The PNoy era Energy Secretary, Jericho “Icot” Petilla was also a politician, but he knew his role. His problem was getting LGU permits for the much-needed power plants. Brownouts were the alternative to a failure to get those new power plants running. So, he assigned one of his undersecretaries to work full time in getting those permits.

Cusi should have done likewise. He had a politician as undersecretary who could have done more good talking to LGUs to speed up permits and ROWs. The courts respond favorably to a representative of the President asking help for facilitating ROWs. I remember Rep. Rene Diaz personally pleading with judges to help complete the needed ROW for the NLEX rehab because then PGMA wanted it fast tracked.

Facilitating acquisition of permits and ROW shouldn’t be a problem if the President exerts his power to ensure timely completion of his infrastructure projects. And Rene Diaz showed how to do it. It is obvious ARTA is useless in helping out. This administration needs someone like Rene to work on the difficult nitty gritty of getting infrastructure projects done on time and at least cost.

Boo Chanco’s email address is [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter @boochanco