MIAA hopes to sign pact with Japanese contractor to complete NAIA-3

The Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) hopes to sign a contract with Japanese firm Takenaka Corp. for the completion of the unfinished portion of the controversial Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) Terminal 3 in Parañaque City.

Lawyer Oscar Paras Jr., MIAA senior assistant general manager, said negotiations are being fast-tracked with Takenaka, the lead contractor of the Philippine International Air Terminals Co. (Piatco) consortium to construct the controversial airport.

Paras said the MIAA is negotiating with Takenaka officials regarding the cost to complete the remaining two percent unfinished portion of the airport after the project was stopped when Piatco failed to settle accumulating unpaid obligations with the Japanese firm.

Paras said that MIAA is still raising some questions regarding the $8 million that Takenaka was charging to finish the terminal in October.

"We’re now deep in negotiations with them so that we can have a contract signed by next month," Paras told The STAR.

MIAA had recently secured a writ of possession from Pasay City Regional Trial Court Judge Jesus Mupas paving the way for the resumption of efforts to make the facility fully operational in the first quarter of 2007.

The government was ordered to takeover the facility from Piatco in December 2004 after the Supreme Court nullified the consortium’s build-operate-transfer contract with the government due to the numerous amendments it made to its original contract that were disadvantageous to the government.

The government subsequently filed an expropriation case over the terminal before the Pasay RTC after the takeover.

Last Friday, MIAA general manager Alfonso Cusi gave Vice President Noli de Castro, Solicitor General Eduardo Nachura, Transportation Secretary Leandro Mendoza and members of the media a brief tour of the airport.

Cusi had expressed confidence that the terminal can be made fully operational by early 2007.

Upon entering the NAIA Terminal III arrival hall lobby where a 100 square meter portion of the ceiling collapsed on March 27, several steel scaffolds still support repaired portions of the ceiling.

The ceiling collapsed four days before the scheduled "soft opening" of NAIA-3 which forced Cusi to call off the test opening.

Cusi confirmed that the steel posts were reinforcements for the sagging portions of the terminal’s ceiling.

He said that the reason for the "weak" ceiling was the screws used by the sub-contractor hired by Takenaka, instead of rivets.

Cusi assured that Takenaka had agreed to correct the weaknesses in the entire ceiling of the terminal.

"It will be part of the work they will do once they start completing the unfinished portion of the terminal," Cusi said.