MARITIME WATCHKEEPER

One can’t help but think that a wave of  incidents in government aptly described as “sophomoric” by critics, is starting to look like a tsunami.  Most notorious are the:

• Cheating in Golf
• Buddies into Jueteng
• Luneta Massacre of Tourists
• Rotting Rice Stocks
• Mislang Tweets
• Kay Ganda Plagiarism

There’s another one at the North Harbor in Manila just simmering and headed for an eruption. The North Harbor Modernization Project which has been tossed like a volleyball for almost two decades due to high-powered competing interests among its stakeholders, is getting stalled again.  Since this is a “big-ticket” project, it would be a surprise if the snag in the project has not reached the Palace.

The current bone of contention is in the matter of the compliance with the terms of the modernization contract won by a consortium headed by Reghis Romero II.  It appears that the current operators of the North Harbor have not been able to provide for the minimum required equipment needed for operations to proceed under a single operator arrangement.

Time line

• 011410 – The Philippine Ports Authority (PPA) issues a Memorandum postponing the turnover of the operations at the Manila North Harbor (NH) to the Manila North Harbour Port, Inc. (MNHPI) to a later date – 15 February 2010.
• 021110 – Memo Report to the PPA-GM recommending for the further postponement of the turn over citing non-compliance with the minimum equipment required to operate the NH stipulated in the Contract with MNHPI.
• 021210 – Another directive is issued by the PPA suspending the turn over of operations to MNHPI.
• 031810 -The Philippine Liner Shipping Association (PLSA) informs MNHPI that an inventory of the equipment present at the NH showed that MNHPI has been unable to mobilize enough equipment at the NH which would meet the minimum equipment required under the MNHPI contract with the PPA.
• 041210 – PPA proceeds to turn over the operation of the entire Manila North Harbor to the MNHPI.
• 060210 – The Philippine Liner Shipping Association (PLSA) writes to PPA complaining about the lack of equipment at the North Harbor eight (8) weeks after MNHPI started its operations.  PLSA suggested an Inventory Team composed of members from PPA, PSLA and another third-party stakeholder.
• 090810 – PPA PMO at the North Harbor conducts an Inventory of MNHPI equipment and sends its findings in a report to the PPA AGM for Operations.
• 092410 - PLSA writes to the new PPA-GM Atty. Juan C. Sta Ana, claiming that an Inventory Report prepared by the PPA Inventory Team over-stated the equipment of MNHPI since it included equipment owned by the PLSA members for their own ships.
• 101910 – The Association of North Harbor Cargo Handler Operators (ANCHOR) sends a letter to the PPAGM citing the apparent violation of the MNHPI contract which had given the contractor more than a year (since September 2009) to fulfill its post-qualification stage.  The letter also pointed out the attempt of PMO North Harbor to misrepresent the items included in the equipment inventory which it prepared and asked PPA for the issuance of a Notice of Violation to MNHPI.
• 110310 – A reply to the letter of ANCHOR was made by the PMO North Harbor after the same was referred to it by the PPAGM.  PMO North Harbor is the very same entity accused of having prepared the over-stated Inventory Report.  Instead of replying to the issues raised in the ANCHOR letter the reply tries to evade the issue by claiming that the questioned report was not yet “ripe for public dissemination”. Furthermore, the letter adds that issues regarding “MNHPI equipment are sub judice due a pending case in the Supreme Court.”

When I read the letter from PMO North Harbor in answer to the ANCHOR allegation of a padded Inventory Report, my head went into a swirl.  I was reminded of a complaint I made ages ago against the PPAGM in connection with the construction of the Eva Macapagal Terminal at the South Harbor.  My letter of complaint, addressed to the Office of the President, went the usual routing path in a bureaucracy and ended, three months later at the desk of the PPAGM, the same person I was complaining about.

I am one of those that have come to know that the current PPAGM is a decent man. I knew Boy Sta Ana when he was previously the Port District Manager of Manila and I do not think that he himself would send a sophomoric letter with the same tenor as the one sent by the PMO North Harbor to ANCHOR.  If he actually gave the go signal for the letter to be sent, then, I stand corrected.

However, I am very much aware that most of his senior officers now who had served the PPA since the time of Juan Pena, through Alfonso Cusi and Oscar Sevilla have intimate knowledge of what has been happening with the North Harbor Modernization Project.  During the time of Juan Pena, PPA almost succeeded in giving the entire Port System in the Philippines to a Consortium.  In fact, some PhP300 million was released just to pay off the service claims of portworkers, but President Estrada’s impeachment aborted the attempt to monopolize the operations of all PPA ports and the PhP300 million I was told has not been properly accounted for.

Cusi, early on in his term promised a transparent and swift implementation of the Modernization Project.  He simply failed to maneuver the project to be implemented as a single operator port.  Oscar Sevilla, was something else.  He went into the motion of accepting a projected study on the North Harbor funded by the USAID based on existing official terms of reference.

However, after the study and its recommendations were turned over to the PPA, the PPAGM offered to pay the consultants PhP153,000 to change the multi-operator recommendation into a single operator port terminal.

A close aid of the PPAGM was recently quoted as having said, “Don’t fret too much about the North Harbor, it’s going to blow up anytime.” I hope it will not blow up in the face of the new PPAGM who, as far as I know, was never involved in the privatization process for the North Harbor. Is he perhaps just too trusting with the PPA old-timers that have cooperated with the previous administrators of this government agency described by Romulo Neri as being under regulatory capture?  I look up to Boy Sta Ana to free PPA from “regulatory capture.”