Greg's suggestion on CICC gets support from governor

Gov. Gwendolyn Garcia yesterday welcomed the suggestion of Vice Governor Gregorio Sanchez that the contract for the construction of Cebu International Convention Center superstructure should be awarded to WT Construction Incorporated if it would not encounter any problem in its work on the CICC substructure.

This developed as the governor said a project monitoring office (PMO) headed by Capitol consultant on infrastructure and development Apollo Enriquez has been created.

She said PMO personnel have been deployed to monitor the progress of the project at the North Reclamation Area and that they would report to the Bids and Awards Committee-Infrastructure for evaluation of WT's performance.

The governor explained that she relies heavily on the advice and assistance of Sanchez, an engineer, who would get updates of the ongoing CICC construction from the PMO.

She agreed with Sanchez's earlier statement that under Republic Act 9184, otherwise known as the Government Procurement Reform Act, awarding contiguous projects to the same contractor is allowable for as long as it incurs no negative slippage.

"In this case, time is of the essence. And if there would be another bidding process, this would mean more time spent in the procurement process of another contractor," she said.

PMO evaluation is ongoing and the governor is hoping that by next week, all will be in place in accordance with the procedures under RA 9184.

"I also subscribe to the suggestion of the vice governor that time is of the essence. The performance of the contractor has shown he has executed the substructure work with efficiency and therefore we would highly recommend WT," she said.

WT is already ahead of schedule by at least two weeks. As of 10:50 p.m. last April 12, it had already completed driving 855 piles, which makes it 18 days ahead of schedule.

Under WT's work schedule, pile-driving works should be completed by the end of the month, and the substructure's construction should be finished by the end of May.

"I would expect that the Bids and Awards Committee-Infrastructure will soon sit down and evaluate, knowing as they do, our opinion as regards the award of the superstructure already as far as the vice governor is concerned, as far as I am concerned," she said.

Sanchez earlier said it would be advantageous to Capitol if WT will be contracted to do the superstructure to offset any delays in the completion of the project.

WT was awarded with the P84.5-million contract to do the substructure of the CICC within 90 days and the construction started last month. - Cristina C. Birondo