PAL payable to MIAA to build Panglao airport

PRESIDENT Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has ordered the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) “to earmark and allocate” a minimum of P3 billion for the construction of the Panglao Bohol International Airport Development Project (PBIADP). Gov. Erico Aumentado said DOTC Secretary Leandro Mendoza confided this to him Monday evening during the dinner President Arroyo tendered for the governors and mayors who attended her State of the Nation Address (SONA) in Malacañang. Aumentado said Mendoza revealed that Capitan Lucio Tan, chair of the Philippine Airlines (PAL) Board has agreed to pay its obligation to the Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA).

This in effect erases doubts critics of the SONA and skeptics earlier expressed regarding funding for the international airport in Bohol. As such, Aumentado who is also president of the Union of Local Authorities of the Philippines (ULAP) and the League of Provinces of the Philippines (LPP) expressed gratitude to the President for the allocation during lunch the following day. Local chief executives had gathered at the Century Park Hotel for the Local Government Units (LGU) Summit .

“The P3 billion will be for the civil works for the airport which is set for completion in September 2009,” he said. Earlier, the DOTC released P125 million for the land acquisition for the runway and for social preparation for which the provincial government also released P40,000.

The PBIADP Task Force headed by DOTC Assistant Secretary Jose Torralba met at the Governor's Mansion Friday to discuss the fund transfer to the provincial government, strategize the lot acquisition, the nitty-gritty in the payment of the landowners and the transfer of ownership in the titles, among others. The land acquisition time line is six months. With the delay in the release of the P125 million however Aumentado expects to complete it in February yet.

Aumentado and Gen. Nilo Jatico, chief of the Air Transportation Office (ATO) representing DOTC signed the memorandum of agreement (MOA) outlining their responsibilities in the land acquisition phase of the project. The other day however lawyer Cesar Sarmiento, Director 3 of DOTC Legal Services, Engr. Victor Andres and another lawyer attended the task for meeting.

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