It’s countdown time. We learned that the Supreme Court (SC) has set Feb. 18 as the date it would declare the Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) either as constitutional or unconstitutional. So we got 12 days to go so better start the countdown because Feb. 18 is just a week before the 28th anniversary of the EDSA People Power Revolution of 1986. You may ask, why is this countdown necessary? Let me count the ways.
Now, if the Supreme Court decides that the DAP was unconstitutional, it will put the Aquino regime into a dizzying tailspin from which I doubt it can recover, because if this happens it would mean that what President Benigno “P-Noy†Aquino III and Department of Budget & Management (DBM} Secretary Florencio “Butch†Abad would have to account for those billions of pesos, especially those funds that were given to the Senators during the Senate impeachment of former Chief Justice Renato Corona.
The DAP was supposedly created to jumpstart the economy with P149 billion given to various programs… not to mention the billions from the Malampaya fund. Surely SC would require that all those monies be returned to the Philippine Treasury and that means everyone, including the Senators who were given P100 million during and after the impeachment trial of CJ Corona. This means the Aquino regime would be spending its last two and a half years in power explaining why this or that money went to whom and must now demand from those who got those monies to return them.
On the other side of the coin… granted that the Supreme Court justices are scared to show its independence and declare the DAP as constitutional, it would certainly incense those indignant people who marched in the million man march in Luneta against the pork barrel. So it’s akin to jumping from the frying pan into the fire. Abangan! We should remind the SC that they too are public servants and serve the interest of the Filipino people at large and not the vested interest of the government’s Executive branch.
* * *
The Cebu Chamber of Commerce & Industry, Inc. (CCCI) through its president Lito Maderazo visited Cebu Governor Hilario Davide III at the Cebu Provincial Capitol, and impressed upon the Governor and the Department of Transportation & Communications (DOTC) to immediately resolve the issues affecting the Mactan-Cebu International Airport (MCIA) expansion project, which has been put on hold to verify issues on the winning bidder, the Megawide/GMR India Corp.
One of the reasons for the urgency that the CCCI prexy pointed out was the holding of the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference in Cebu next year. Come now, granted that the DOTC approved the Megawide/GMR India consortium for Mactan, they won’t even be halfway in construction when this Asia-Pacific Conference kicks off next year. What we need to know from the DOTC aside from the issues raised against Megawide/GMR is why this project reached that ridiculous amount without a second runway? This has always been our beef and a concern of many Cebuanos.
I just got an email from a good friend that in Vietnam they are constructing a second runway in Cam Ranh Bay as they expect it to be another international airport. In Vietnam you either go to Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon or to Hanoi, while Cam Ranh Bay isn’t even on the international map as yet. But the Vietnamese want to lure tourists to Cam Ranh Bay and they are doing the right thing by building a second runway in order to improve their runway capacity. Here in Cebu I’ve been asking for a second runway in the past 15 years, only to be told that we don’t need it yet.
This has always been the mentality of the folks who run the DOTC from the previous administration up to today. This is why the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) is experiencing massive delays due to airport congestion. Indeed, the main thoroughfares of Metro Manila, especially EDSA is so clogged, using that road has become a joke! Thanks to those mindless bureaucrats who cannot forecast the volume of traffic either in our national roads or our airports.
Incidentally, we got in our email a report that the Megawide/GMR deal is already a done deal because one of its directors, which we will not name as of now, visited the DOTC offices last Jan. 22 according to the logbook at the DOTC. This fellow is well-connected to DOTC bigwigs, and we suspect that the dice has been loaded on the side of Megawide/GMR.
Mind you, the second bidder Filinvest/Changi has questioned this deal. But I too would like to know from them if their deal included a second runway? If it doesn’t include a second runway then it is pointless to have this deal approved at all. It’s about time that the DOTC officialdom realizes that if they approved this deal they will face a bevy of lawsuits.
* * *
Email: vsbobita@mozcom.com or vsbobita@gmail.com