IT WAS one noteworthy gathering, something that must replicated.
Not because it had business tycoon Manuel V. Pangilinan (MVP) in it, but because of how it could push for the further development of airport inside Clark Freeport.
The business forum recently conducted by the Kapampangan Development Foundation (KDF) gathered together Pampanga’s decision makers from both the government and private sector.
It came extra significant because MVP, its chairman, was celebrating his birthday in Pampanga that day – something he has been doing as a tradition for the past few years now and is very much a welcome event in the province.
Livelihood. During the visit, KDF that has been known for its various outreach programs, has forged an agreement with Mekeni Food Corporation. The pact calls for a backyard piggery project where less fortunate families in Pampanga would benefit.
They will be given 15 heads of piglets each which they themselves will raise. In return, Mekeni will have to help supervise the raising, subject to their standards and then probably take them in for meat production and eventual processing. Thus, this undertaking is seen to help a lot of families who barely make both ends meet.
Soft spoken and very unassuming as he always is, Mekeni top honcho Pruds Garcia signed the contract with no less than MVP himself. It was also witnessed by Secretary Kiko Sison and KDF President Benny Ricafort.
Also present then were the other movers and shakers of Pampanga and Central Luzon like Pamcham Chairman Levi P. Laus, Rene Romero, CDC President Art Tugade and CIAC President Chichos Luciano, technocrat Dennis Uy and many others.
For his part, Garcia said that the MOA is part of the company’s CSR program, especially in helping alleviate poverty in the province.
Lead Speaker. The business forum assembled not only people who matter in Pampanga. It also had men who run the affairs of Clark – the airport and the Freeport.
Atty. Art Tugade spoke about what was being achieved in Clark Freeport under his watch. He was very expressive and confident, taking almost everyone’s attention with his powerful presentation.
He reported on some things he instituted in Clark like policy reforms that eased even more the way of doing business in Clark.
Among the adopted new policies in CDC is the three-year Certificate of Registration and Tax Exemption (CoRTE), where locators and investors are no longer required to register on an annual basis.
Tugade said this policy helps extinguish a perceived corruption in CDC, adding that such ‘perception’ is one the ‘enemies’ of CDC in effectively performing its mandate.
To also help locators, Tugade said that CDC reduced processing time of permits and other business requirements by 30 to 50 percent.
These policy reforms is helping CDC transform itself from a regulatory corporation into a partner that has boosted business enhancement programs.
Other speakers in the forum included Bernie Angeles who represented the provincial government of Pampanga and NEDA Assistant Regional Director Victor Baldo.
The Airport. Of course the forum would not have been made complete without discussions on Clark International Airport.
MVP was all eyes and ears on the subject, raising many questions at some points in the presentation of CIAC President Chichos Luciano. We all know for a fact how MVP and Metro Pacific has been pouring great interest in developing Clark’s airport.
MVP sounded once again a clarion call for Pampanga to push hard for the development of Clark airport as a premier gateway of the country.
Politely cutting Luciano to make an important remark, MVP said “can I just make one rather very important point?”
“Pampanga should assert itself,” he said, even urging media to help Pampanga drive this point. Pangilinan said.
He also described as “stupid” the observations and claims that NAIA is far from Clark with its physical distance of 100 kilometers.
He added that distance should be measured by travel time and not by measurement of actual distance.
“Clearly, Clark to NAIA is about 100 kilometers so that’s the perception. We probably have the longest distance for any pair of airports in the world as indeed we probably do, but I find it a very stupid argument because technology has moved ahead to make distance agnostic,” he said.
That stance is shared by a lot of people, given today’s technology and the physical connectivity of major thoroughfares like NLEX and SLEX, the 100-kilometer distance will not be a factor anymore soon as it would cut travel time significantly.
Travel time is more essential than the measurement of the actual distance, Pangilinan furthered. “It (distance) doesn’t matter… what you do is to speed up the train system,” he added.
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Federal System. Former CDC President Ping Remollo was briefly in town for the Kapihan organized by CAMI every Fridays at Bale Balita.
As a lawyer himself, he is for a federal system of government where various regions would have their own funds to disburse so as not to bother the national coffers anymore and thus prevent controversies like PDAF and DAP.
He makes sense in his presentation (with his own drawings on white board) where each region should have carefully master planned program, with physical inter island connectivity even Bohol, Cebu, Negro, Panay, Iloilo and Negros.
He made use of Visayas as an example where there are good airports and where revenues and further development could be driven by tourism with Boracay as an anchor. And taking this example in the Visayas, the same could be replicated in Luzon and Mindanao regions.
He also suggest wearing of a red, white and blue ribbon (the main colors of our flag) in order to avoid polarization, especially at a time when our country would also need support for its Gilas Pilipinas that will compete in the upcoming FIBA World Basketball Cup in Spain.