Lucio Tan’s MacroAsia, China’s CCCC sole bidder for $10-B Sangley airport project

The group of Lucio Tan’s MacroAsia Corp. and China Communications Construction Co. Ltd. (CCCC) has not yet secured the contract to expand the Sangley Airport in Cavite even if it was the sole bidder for the $10-billion project, Cavite Governor Jonvic Remulla said Thursday.

The bids were opened on Tuesday, December 17,  and only MacroAsia-CCCC submitted the bid documents.

“But they still have to pass the technical evaluation of their bid. So, no guarantees,” Remulla told GMA News Online.

A two-to-four week review will begin on December 27, the governor said.

If MacroAsia-CCCC fails the bid evaluation, the government will rebid the project Remulla said. “We will have to open the bid process again.”

The Sangley International Airport project is a joint venture between the private sector and the local government unit of Cavite. In such a set-up, the project does not need to secure the approval of other government agencies such as the National Economic and Development Authority.

The private partner will build the airport and the facilities, while the provincial government will reclaim and lease the land to the winning bidder.

The Cavite government originally intended to do the project on its own. But Remulla said the “government bidding process is too cumbersome so we would rather that they lease the land from us and they put up an airport company before. Everything would be private.”

The operations and maintenance will go through a separate bidding after the airport and is facilities have been completed.

The expanded Sangley Airport will have four runways and will be able to accommodate up to 100 million passengers a year.

The Department of Transportation (DOTr) took over Sangley Airport’s construction after President Rodrigo Duterte ordered to have the project completed by November 2019.

The government tapped Unimaster Conglomeration Inc. as contractor for P486.028 million.

Remulla earlier said the Cavite government will reimburse DOTr’s expenses once the Sangley Airport expansion is ready to be implemented.

There has been renewed interest in building airports outside of Metro Manila, as NAIA—the country’s premier gateway—has reached overcapacity.

Currently serving at least 42 million passengers, the four NAIA terminals were designed to accommodate 31 million passengers a year. —VDS, GMA News