Gov’t sued for P4B for canceled dredging

SAN PEDRO, Laguna—The foreign contractor of the shelved Laguna Lake Rehabilitation dredging project has filed a case at an international arbitration body and sought 70 million euros, or P4 billion, in damages from the Philippine government.

The Baggerwerken Decloedt en Zoon (BDC), a Belgian company, “has formally filed its case at the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) in Washington D.C. on September 22,” said a source, who requested anonymity for lack of authority to give an official statement, in a phone interview last Friday.

ICSID is an international arbitration forum under the World Bank Group.

The source, a Filipino, formerly held a position in the BDC before President Benigno Aquino III canceled last year the P18-billion contract that was tagged as among the “midnight deals” of the previous administration.

“The BDC has never received a formal letter from (Aquino) canceling the contract. They have only done it through press statements,” the source said.

The Laguna Lake Rehabilitation project, most of which was supposed to require dredging the lake, was approved during the time of former President and now Pampanga Representative Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.

Apart from the damage claim, BDC is also seeking P500 million from the government over the Pasig River Rehabilitation project.

The BDC is also the contractor in a project to dredge the Pasig River up to the mouth of Marikina River.