P23 billion earmarked for Zamboanga City infra projects

Zamboanga City (Image from Google Maps)

ZAMBOANGA CITY — Some P23 billion has been earmarked for projects for this city under the Duterte administration’s Build, Build, Build (BBB) program, according to presidential spokesperson Harry Roque.

“Zamboanga City will get a whopping P23 billion of the government’s P8.44-trillion budget for the BBB,” Roque said on Saturday.

The presidential spokesperson was in the city to witness the oath taking of about 760 barangay officials and to serve as one of the principal wedding sponsors of a Ruste family member, who owns one of the biggest construction businesses here.

Roque said the projects earmarked for Zamboanga would include building 102 roads worth P1.16 billion, among them, a 36-kilometer bypass road expected to be completed within the year.

“The bypass [road] will connect Zamboanga City to the cities of Dipolog, Pagadian as well as facilitate the transport of boat to the Zamboanga freeport from Labuan district,” Roque said.

He said the construction of all these projects would start this year and be completed before 2022.

Roque said the government had included in the budget P2 billion for the modernization of the Zamboanga airport, which he said had not been improved for years.
“Your suffering is over,” Roque said in Filipino. “Finally you will have a decent airport a bit far from the town proper.”

He assured people here that their lives would would improve once all the BBB projects had become operational. /atm