He resigned after just a year in office.
Yes, Arrey Perez, resigned as president and CEO of Clark International Airport Corporation (CIAC). He has finally revealed where he is heading next. It is going to be at the Metro Pacific Tollways Corporation (MPTC), the tollroad arm of the MVP Group. An interim post, most likely.
In his FB page, Perez posted a logo of the MPTC with the caption “now on to building a stronger nation with seamless connectivity”. It was posted on the date when his resignation took effect (or at least his last day at CIAC). The FB post also came 25 years exactly to the date when he first started in government service.
That includes one year in an LGU, four years at Commission on Audit and 19 years at Bases Conversion and Development Authority which he left as Senior Vice President.
His stint at CIAC was so short at one year. But it was not without huge impact.
He conceptualized and envisioned Seven Flagship Programs that saved that government corporation from oblivion, if not, abolition. One must remember that CIAC sort of “lost” the airport when the national government awarded the right to operate and manage the Clark International Airport (airport code: CRK) to LIPAD, a private consortium. This has led to a joke that suggests that CIAC just rename itself into “Clark International Corporation” where the airport is dropped as a result of the private concession.
But just like what Arrey advocated, an airport area is more than just having airplanes, passengers and terminals. It is building an aerotropolis or airport city where logistics, warehousing, hotels, restaurants and other infrastructure are also a part of.
The flagship projects was topbilled by the so-called Clark National Food Hub. This undertaking was like an aircraft for CIAC. It took off right away with passengers that put faith on Perez’s leadership. It immediately took off the ground and has even secured Congressional approval with P3 billion seed money for its flight that would take also our farmers, fisherfolk, traders to a better destination.
Riding on this flight are the stellar bankrollers, financers, think tanks like the Asian Development Bank, NEDA, DTI and many others. His flagship projects and the airport city he envisions were even packaged and launched with a new brand: Clark Aviation Capital. I hope that someone continues to adopt that project.
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AT MPTC, he is much anticipated, if not awaited with excitement.
I and my colleagues at Pampanga Press Club should know as we spent the weekend right in Cordova, Cebu with some executives of the NLEX Corporation and the CCLE Corporation – two of MPTC’s best tollroads in terms of maintenance, length, design, features and modernity. The former runs the NLEX and SCTEX and the latter the CCLEX which connect Cebu City to Mactan Islands. Must I tell here how these people run their communication and marketing programs with such efficiency, competence and professionalism. Take a bow there sir Luigi Bautista and Allan Alfon for the steer.
Why are they agog about Arrey’s assumption? Aside from being dashing, debonair and young, he is full of bright ideas. Aside from being branded too as “papalicious” in Clark (pardon the term), he is a man with so much contribution to government service.
Arrey would be filling big shoes of great minds in infrastructure and public utilities like former DPWH Secretary Rogelio Singson who is said to be turning over the reins of MPTC to the former. Also a tough act to follow is Rodrigo Franco who is credited for the successful built of CCLEX. Include there too another former DPWH secretary Ping De Jesus who once headed the Manila North Tollways Corporation, the predecessor of NLEX Corporation.
Lest we forget that at BCDA, Arrey was involved mostly in the master planning of former military base lands into economic hubs in the Philippines such as the Fort Bonifacio, Clark Air Base, Camp John Hay, Poro Point Naval Station. His participation in the planning for these had contributed in the generation of around ₱200 billion worth of contracts from sales, leases and joint ventures.
These places are now drivers of economic of growth -- the Bonifacio Global City, Mckinley Hills, the Newport City located in the Philippines’ national capital region, Clark Freeport, the New Clark City and of course the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway in Central Luzon, to name just a few.
Arrey is such a loss to government service. Losing a Harvard-trained man, losing a young bright mind who did his part in squeezing ideas, concepts and implementing government conversion programs for the former military bases.
All told, as one of the think tanks and implementors at BCDA, the government managed to rake in not just billions of pesos but also a global recognition that something good is indeed happening in the Philippines in terms of infrastructure, tourism and travel.
These happened because of men like Perez, BCDA’s current president Joshua Bingcang (who also rose from the ranks), their former boss in BCDA Vince Dizon, LIPAD President Noel Manankil who once headed also the Clark Development Corporation.
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At MPTC, I was told, he would be in an interim post while the tollroads of both the MVP Group of Cabalen Manny V. Pangilinan and San Miguel Corporation of boss Ramon S. Ang are still being merged under a new corporate entity.
When established, the new company, an impeccable source said that Arrey would be the Chief Operating Officer as this is what Boss RSA would want for him. Another source said that MVP is just so delighted to have him and would be given an option to pick what position he would deem to best fit his portfolio. Whatever the case may be, he would be directly reporting to MVP and RSA when these two gentlemen decides who would be president and chairman. How blessed is this man having both the trust and confidence of great visionaries of our time!
As the tollroads which he will be overseeing, that faith in him and the application of wits from government to private would also be seamless.