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Saturday, June 25, 2005
No P2.5B yet for tunnel?
By Gingging A. Campa
Sun.Star Staff Reporter
Iis there money available for the proposed P2.5-billion tunnel, the only component needed to complete the Cebu South Coastal Road Project?
Cebu City Councilor Gabriel Leyson believes the National Government does not have the counterpart fund for the project, which is being proposed for inclusion in the 27th Yen Loan Package of the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC).
South Reclamation Project (SRP) manager Nigel Paul Villarete confirmed there’s no money available yet, because the detailed designs and other papers needed for evaluation have yet to reach JBIC.
But Villarete said the technical board of the Neda Infrastructure Coordinating Committee (ICC) has approved the project, which is now being evaluated by the Cabinet committee of the ICC.
“From there, it will go to the National Economic Development Authority (Neda) board to be endorsed for the bilateral negotiation with JBIC,” he added.
Despite the long process of evaluating the project, Villarete is sure this will get JBIC’s approval.
“There is no way that JBIC will not approve. It does not leave its projects half-baked or halfway. It will not make a road, which is an expressway, that stops in the central business district of Cebu City. It has to continue to the arterial road, which is McArthur Blvd.,” he told Sun.Star Cebu yesterday.
Leyson, chairman of the council committee on infrastructure and foreign-funded projects, said JBIC already approved the original design of a segment of the coastal road, which was to put up a flyover over Plaza Independencia.
This would have stretched up to McArthur Blvd.
But because of variations in the project, the Garcia administration had proposed a tunnel, instead of a flyover.
The Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) 7, which is implementing the coastal road and the proposed tunnel, is now working on the approach of the tunnel on the offshore platform, five hectares from Compania Maritima.
DPWH 7 Director Juanito Abergas has proposed to use the P900 million for the pre-construction activities of the tunnel, otherwise the money will revert to the general fund if there is no activity by the end of the year.
The project is expected to start by 2006 and is aimed to ease traffic along M.J. Cuenco Ave. by 2008.
If the National Government needs to put up a counterpart for the JBIC loan, it will need about 25 percent of the loan amount, Villarete said.
Several Philippine Government agencies are involved in the evaluation of the project, funded through Overseas Development Assistance (ODA).
Villarete, who used to work with Neda and helped evaluate and endorsed the SRP for JBIC funding, said these are “just the normal processes of the ODA-funded project, until both governments of the Philippines and Japan reach a diplomatic culmination.”
Besides, DPWH Manila has conducted an international pre-qualification of contractors for the tunnel. Villarete expects that by December, the agency will be able to award the contract to the winning bidder.
Asked why pre-qualification activities are being conducted when there are no funds available yet, Villarete said, “For so many years, this has been done by DPWH.”
(June 25, 2005 issue)
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