The Ninoy Aquino International Airport Press Corps is being asked by Naia officials to settle phone bills to the tune of P2.8 million.
In a letter dated May 18 and addressed to the group’s president, DWIZ’s Raoul Esperas, the Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) recalled that the press club requested a landline in July 1999 and had since incurred bills amounting to P2,849,033.21.
The letter, signed by Ma. Julieth Torres, officer in charge of the airport collection division, said the figure represents telephone, EVAT and interest charges from October 1999 to April 2015.
Esperas, who got the letter on Tuesday, said many of his members interpreted MIAA’s move as a form of “harassment… for reasons we still don’t know.”
“In any typical press corps, they don’t charge you. They provided us an office more than two decades ago. It was part of their support [for] they believe we could help them in disseminating information,” added Esperas, the press corps president since last year.
But according to MIAA Assistant General Manager Vicente Guerzon, the media group signed an agreement stating that the phone bills would be shouldered by the press corps.
“When they applied for a telephone [line], there was an undertaking that was put in writing. They have been paying and then suddenly it stopped,” Guerzon recalled. “We need to have a justification [before the Commission on Audit] as to why it was not being paid.’’