MABALACAT, PAMPANGA – The two Japanese contractors of the Bases Conversion Development Authority have agreed to build the four interchanges on the Pampanga and Clark Freeport sides of the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway and finish these by mid-2009.

Narciso Abaya, BCDA president and chief executive officer, confirmed this to the Inquirer on Thursday on the eve of the opening of the Clark-Tarlac segment.

The Floridablanca and Porac interchanges will be built by the Kajima Corp., Obayashi Corp., JFE Engineering Corp. and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd. (KOJM), the builder of the 50.5-km Subic-Clark portion.

The Clark North and Clark South interchanges will be done by the Hazama-Taisei-Nippon Steel (HTN) Joint Venture, which completed the 43.27-km Clark-Tarlac segment.

Abaya said KOJM and the HTN agreed to do the interchanges because the project’s contract required them to undertake additional works.

The general managers of the two joint ventures declined to be interviewed on Thursday when the BCDA kicked off here its project to plant 20,000 trees in five years along the 94-km highway.

In previous interviews, they confirmed the hesitancy but declined to give the reasons for such.

Abaya said the construction of the interchanges would be funded by the P6.1-billion supplemental loan obtained by the BCDA from the Japan Bank for International Cooperation.

The JBIC also provided the P21-billion loan to build the SCTEx, the country’s newest and longest toll road.

Construction works have started for the Clark North, including its 3.8-km Panday Pira Road leading straight to the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport, the country’s port of entry for the open skies regime of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations starting December this year.

The Clark South is being built as well.

Since the opening of the Subic-Clark segment on April 29, the Tollways Management Corp. reported a daily toll collection of P550,000.

This was below the projected income, Abaya said, adding that he hoped that over time and with the opening of the interchanges, more motorists would use the SCTEx.

The loan, payable in 30 years, has a 10-year grace period for the payment of the principal that starts in 2013. The government has begun paying the loan interest.

The BCDA will formally open the Clark-Tarlac section, which ends in La Paz town, at 12:01 a.m. on Friday.

“This brings us closer to the vision of President Macapagal-Arroyo to make Subic and Clark into an international logistics and service hub,” Abaya said at the launch of the greening project.

“Traveling here is fuel efficient. It is a safe access to the North,” he said. “This is a historic moment. It is record-setting [because] it was finished in three years’ time.”