The governor, who went to meet the five ambassadors at the CICC site in the North Reclamation Area of Mandaue City, told reporters the latter were reportedly impressed with the pace of the construction.
This as while the targeted date for the completion of the CICC was originally slated for November 15, the schedule has been moved earlier to October 31.
The ambassadors who came were those from Brunei Darussalam, Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand. A representative from Cambodia was also present. All five countries are member countries of the ASEAN.
The ambassador of Korea, one of its dialogue partners were also here together with China's deputy chief of nation, Japan's and New Zealand's first secretary, India's first secretary and charge d' affaires, and the representatives of other countries, such as Australia.
The ambassadors and representatives from other countries that will take part in the upcoming 12th ASEAN Summit and related summits were here yesterday to check on various hotels where their chiefs of states will be billeted.
These are the Shangri-La Mactan Resort and Spa, Plantation Bay Resort, Hilton Cebu Resort and Spa Hotel, Marco Polo Hotel, and Marriott Cebu City Hotel.
The ambassadors and others representatives were also here to check on the progress of the CICC.
Ambassador Marciano Paynor Jr., who sits as the secretary general for the national organizing committee and as chairman of the local organizing committee for the ASEAN Summit preparations, had already clarified that 90 percent of the activities related to the summit will be held in the CICC.
The completion of the CICC substructure is almost a month ahead of its construction work schedule, that is it was already completed last April 28 instead of its targeted completion date last May 23.
In the absence of a negative slippage, the Project Monitoring Office of the said project led by Enriquez will be recommending to the Bids and Awards Committee for infrastructure projects that the contract for the construction of the superstructure will also be awarded to the same contractor, the WT Construction.
WT quoted the lowest bid at P84.5 million for the construction of the 100-million substructure of the CICC and has passed all the criteria for post-qualification.
Capitol has allocated a total P250 million for the construction of both the substructure and superstructure of the CICC. It intends to keep within the budget.
In the meantime, the contractor is doing the site development and fencing, which works should have started sometime in July or August, while waiting for the awarding of the contract for the superstructure.
The PMO is on the process of evaluating the cost of the superstructure because its project cost is needed before bidding and/or subsequent awarding of the contract can be done. - Cristina C. Birondo