Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo on Thursday welcomed a lawmaker’s proposal to give emergency powers to President Rodrigo Duterte to speed up his administration’s “Build, Build, Build” (BBB) infrastructure program.
At a press briefing, Panelo said he supported House Bill No. 5456 filed by Albay Rep. Joey Salceda to further empower the President “to ensure the effective implementation, reconfiguration and harmonization of national and local government projects.”
“I think the proposal of Salceda is good,” he said, pointing out that it would allow Mr. Duterte to resolve issues that impair the progress of the government’s ambitious infrastructure program.
“One of the reasons why projects are getting delayed are right of way (ROW) issues. We encounter problems when the owners [of the land concerned] do not agree and file temporary restraining orders,” Panelo said.
“But if there are [emergency] powers, then the implementation will be continuous,” he added.
Senate Minority Leader Franklin Drilon, however, saw no need for emergency powers to rev up the BBB program.
Knee-jerk reaction
Drilon said the nonimplementation of planned infrastructure projects was an indication of the problem of underspending, which is what should be given “emergency attention” instead of the “knee-jerk reaction” of emergency powers.
“You do not need an emergency power to make sure that you spend the money allotted on time,” he told reporters.
The senator on Tuesday criticized the record of the BBB program as a “dismal failure” after economic managers told the Senate that only nine of the initial 75 flagship projects had begun construction.
On Thursday, Drilon said the government could fast-track the projects even without special powers for the President by hiring the 2,000 engineers needed to get the projects going, among other things.
Revised list
Earlier, Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Ernesto Pernia said the government would revise the list of 75 flagship projects to include more economically feasible and doable ones.
Drilon said that amending the list was a “face-saving” move since it covered new projects that were already going on.
Of the original 75 projects, 28 have been dropped and 53, including ongoing ones, were added “so that at the end of this administration, it can be claimed that out of 100 flagship projects, so many were done and get good grades,” the senator said.
“There’s nothing wrong with that, but maybe transparency would be a better standard, would be a better attitude,” he added.
Transport Secretary Arthur Tugade on Thursday said it was “grossly unfair to assess the success of the program by merely looking at the implementation of flagship projects.
“Many of [these] require immense preconstruction work, such as right of way acquisition and community resettlement,” he said in a statement.
“We submit, then, that the appropriate standard should consider all infrastructure projects under the BBB.”
Of the newly identified 100 projects, the Department of Transportation (DOTr) is in charge of nearly 40, including those that began this year—the Metro Rail Transit (MRT) 7 line extension, MRT 3 rehabilitation, Metro Manila subway and Philippine National Railways north-south extension lines.
Many more have yet to begin construction, plagued as they are by ROW issues and delayed government approval. These include the Edsa Greenways and Taguig Integrated Terminal Exchange.
None of the flagship projects under the DOTr have been completed.
Figure of speech
In an interview on CNN Philippines on Thursday, Panelo clarified his remarks that the previous administration had “zero accomplishments” in infrastructure projects as a “figure of speech.”
“Figure of speech. In other words, they exaggerate, I also exaggerate a bit. I’m just throwing their own words to them,” he said when asked to comment on the projects completed or initiated by the previous administration.
For his part, Sen. Panfilo Lacson questioned the “poor planning” in the budget of the Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH), citing several items that had incomplete or vague descriptions or scope of work, or showed overlapping projects or were misplaced.
Lacson also said some DPWH projects were requested by legislators, which department officials found hard to turn down. This was why he could not blame the DPWH, he added.
Public Works Secretary Mark Villar said anybody, including legislators, could submit requests for projects to the department. All the projects in its budget are vetted first, he said.
According to Lacson, the inclusion of vague or incomplete items in the DPWH budget was a concern because the funds allocated for these could remain unused if the projects could not be implemented.
In 2018, P275 billion was not used due to poor planning and because the implementing agency was not consulted before the project was included in the budget on the request of some legislators, according to Lacson.
Sen. Sonny Angara, who defended the DPWH budget, said the department, informed of the incomplete items, had already submitted errata to provide the necessary details.—WITH A REPORT FROM KRIXIA SUBINGSUBING