NAIA Consortium to resubmit agreement
RICHMOND MERCURIO The STAR | The Philippine Star | 29 Apr 2019
The super consortium of seven conglomerates seeking to rehabilitate the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) will resubmit today their proposal to the government in hopes of maintaining its upper hand in the project.
“They committed to submit on Monday,” Transportation Undersecretary for Planning Ruben Reinoso told
The NAIA Consortium submitted a revised proposal last Thursday as part of its commitment to comply with the April 30 deadline set by the Department of Transportation (DOTr).
Following the submission last week, DOTr gave its comments on the proposal. The consortium is now set to resubmit its offer today based on the government’s comments.
The NAIA Consortium, composed of some of the country’s biggest conglomerates which are Aboitiz InfraCapital Inc., AC Infrastructure Holdings Corp., Alliance Global Group Inc., Asia’s Emerging Dragon Corp., Filinvest Development Corp., JG Summit Holdings Inc., and Metro Pacific Investments Corp., has previously expressed eagerness to comply and even compromise in order to finalize its concession agreement with the government.
Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade said last month that his agency is giving the NAIA Consortium until April 30 to finish its concession agreement, otherwise, the government or another private entity would undertake the project instead.
“I will stop talking with the consortium if nothing happens. The discussions have taken so long that is why I am saying that I want to put a cap. It cannot take forever that is why there needs to be a deadline. By April 30, if we do not arrive at a common ground, then we will do the project on the DOTr-MIAA side,” Tugade said.
The NAIA Consortium intends to invest P102 billion to rehabilitate, upgrade, expand, operate, and maintain the aging NAIA.
The proposal involves expanding and interconnecting the existing terminals of NAIA, upgrading airside facilities, developing commercial facilities to increase airline and airport efficiencies, enhancing passenger comfort and experience, and elevating the status of NAIA as the country’s premier international gateway.
The group has committed to implement the improvements with minimal disruption to ongoing airport operations, as well as start work immediately after the airport is turned over to them.
The consortium was granted the original proponent status (OPS) by the Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) board in Aug. 6, 2018, and was officially awarded with the OPS on Sept. 13, 2018.
The DOTr was previously targeting to complete the Swiss challenge process for the NAIA rehabilitation proposal in 2018, but has been pushed back due to problems encountered in the negotiations for the concession agreement.
The NAIA Consortium’s unsolicited proposal, which was submitted to the DOTr and to the MIAA on Feb. 12 last year, aims to transform the country’s main international gateway into a regional airport hub by expanding its capacity to meet the anticipated growth in passenger traffic from the economies of the Philippines and the region.
The project supports the government’s Build Build Build program with a plan to develop NAIA into a worldclass facility and a regional air transport hub by upgrading its airside, landside and air navigation support — building on the gains already achieved by the DOTr in terms of improving the traffic of aircraft movements on its runways.
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