A TOP official of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) reported that the construction of the Iligan City Circumferential(C-3) Road Project is 15.17 percent complete as of April this year.

“The project is targeted for completion in 2010 but upon the directive of Public Works & Highways Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane Jr., we have moved it to an earlier date which is December 2009,” Engr. Jerome M. Dela Rosa, Regional Director of DPWH Region Northern Mindanao, said.

"The Manny Pacquiao Blog". Click here for stories and updates on the Filipino boxing champ.

A commitment of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo during her State of the Nation Address, the Iligan C-3 project is listed under the Mindanao Agribusiness Super Region with a total cost of P363.095 million.

About P50 million of the fund was already released in 2008 while the remaining P313.095 million has been released, early this year, he said.

Due to the road right of way (RROW) problem, however, suspension order no. 1 was undertaken effective September 15, 2009, but payment for the affected families along the Pugaan and Iligan Bridges is on-going using the P3 million fund provided by the local government unit of Iligan.

Meanwhile, Dela Rosa said the Environmental Compliance Certificate (ECC) of the East-West Lateral Road in the Iligan-Bukidnon or Lanao del Norte-Bukidnon Road Project, another Super Region project committed by President Arroyo, has already been approved and its feasibility study in the Iligan side have been completed.

Converted to national road in August 2006 per Republic Act 9348, the Iligan-Bukidnon Road has a total length of 228.83 km. that would connect the two Lanao provinces with that of Bukidnon in Northern Mindanao.

Particularly for the Lanao del Norte side, the length of the road is 63.03 km. of which 6.762 km. is concrete paved while the rest or 56.268 km. is gravel road.

Some 1.225 km. of the road was already completed, as of April 2, 2009, from the P35 million provided by the Iligan local government unit and P10 million by the Provincial Government of Lanao del Norte released last year.

This year, DPWH is awaiting the release of P80 million for the concreting, at the Iligan Side, of the Iligan-Bukidnon Road.

Above all these releases, at least P1.175 billion more is needed to complete the whole stretch of the road at Lanao del Norte side, Dela Rosa added. (PIA)