Security beefed up at NAIA

INQUIRER FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines – Security has been tightened and police visibility increased at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, particularly Terminal 3, after Friday’s gangster-movie-style killing of the mayor of a town in Mindanao, his wife and two others.

Checkpoints have been set up at the approaches to the publicly accessible arrival and departure areas of the terminal, with airport security and Philippine National Police operatives opening car trunks and quizzing the vehicles’ occupants.

Policemen were also seen accompanying airport security personnel posted at the entrances to the terminal. More security guards were seen roving around the arrival and departure bays.

Chief Inspector Alex Lim, an officer of the PNP-Aviation Security Group contingent at Terminal 3, told reporters that 20 more police personnel were deployed to the terminal building to augment the 48 regularly deployed there.

Airport authorities expect the number of vacationers and tourists traveling to the provinces to rise this weekend before Christmas.

Meanwhile, the airport security group turned over on Saturday all evidence and written testimonies regarding Friday’s shooting to a special investigation task force headed by Senior Superintendent Billy Beltran of the Southern Police District.

The task force has completed an artist’s sketch of the lone gunman from descriptions provided by over 10 witnesses. The portrait was to be computerized over the weekend and to be made public on Monday.

In a television interview, Beltran said his task force was looking into the possibility that the person or group behind two previous assassination attempts on Mayor Ocol Talumpa of Labangan, Zamboanga del Sur, was also behind Friday’s lethal attack.

Manila International Airport Authority general manager Jose Angel Honrado said his office would be conferring with the aviation police and the SPD to delineate areas of responsibility in the NAIA complex.

“We will be working with them to map out ways to improve the security in our airport terminals,” he said.

He said the terminal’s driveway, where Friday’s shooting took place, was considered a public area and not subject to rigid security precautions such as x-ray inspection and body searches done on people who enter the terminal building proper.

Honrado said police visibility in and around Terminal 3 was “okay” when the shooting took place. Witnesses said the gunman wore a police uniform.

The MIAA chief said closed-circuit television cameras were to be installed soon outside the terminal building  so security personnel could monitor what is going on outside more effectively and respond quickly to potential or actual contingencies.

Honrado said the CCTV cameras were  “on their way,” adding that their installation was part of the $40-million rehabilitation contract awarded by the Department of Transportation and Communications to Takenaka Corp. last month that covers 23 systems.

Aside from the security cameras, the systems to be repaired, installed or expanded include baggage handling, flight information displays, computer terminals, gate coordination, and fire protection systems, Honrado said.

He referred reporters’ inquiries as to when the CCTV cameras would be installed to Takenaka and the Department of Transportation and Communication. He said he was told that all the rehabilitation work would be completed by July next year.

Takenaka was the primary subcontractor of the Terminal 3’s builder, Philippine International Air Terminals Co., Inc. The terminal was expropriated by the government in 2004 and became operational in 2008.

The MIAA itself was supposed to bid out the contract for the CCTV camera in the middle of last year but the bidding process was suspended by Honrado over allegations of irregularities. One of the MIAA’s assistant general managers, Salvador Peñaflor, quit last October, and cited the delayed CCTV bidding as one of the reasons behind his resignation.

Honrado confirmed Penaflor’s resignation but refused to divulge the reasons behind it. MIAA sources said Honrado suspended the bidding process after getting reports that the terms of the bidding were leaked to some of the bidders. He reportedly asked all the members of the bidding and awards committee to place themselves under investigation and take a lie detector test.

The BAC chief, airport police chief Alger Tan, resigned in August.

Airport sources, however, claimed the bidding fiasco might be the doing of influential bidders who were disqualified.

The DOTC eventually took over the bidding and integrated it with the contract awarded to Takenaka.

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