DPWH men linked to PEA road scandal?

Another scandal may yet rock the controversy-plagued Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) as some of its officials were being linked to a multimillion-peso anomaly in the construction of the President Diosdado Macapagal Boulevard (PDMB) on the Manila Bay reclamation area.

Documents obtained by The STAR showed that certain officials of the DPWH’s Special Buildings Project Management Office (SBPMO) recommended the contractors for the P800-million road.

"That is not possible. The DPWH has nothing to do with PEA (Public Estates Authority)," an incredulous Public Works Secretary Simeon Datumanong exclaimed when asked for comment on the issue.

"Give me your source, I want to investigate that," Datumanong added.

The records also indicated that JD Legaspi Construction, the contractor that won the bidding for the PDMB, was not qualified to implement the project.

The PDMB, designed to lighten traffic along Roxas Boulevard and the Coastal Road in Parañaque City, was originally estimated at P500 million, but the amount swelled to P800 million, allegedly due to cost padding.

Certain PEA officials insisted, however, that the price adjustment was justifiable.

Datumanong conceded that it was irregular for the SBPMO which specializes in the implementation of vertical infrastructures, to be involved in road construction.

"We have nothing to do with horizontal constructions. Our concern is only vertical construction," acting SBPMO chief Lito Damo said. "We have no expertise on that," Damo stressed.

The documents indicated that the PEA awarded the PDMB project to JD Legaspi which submitted the lowest bid.

Sources pointed out, however, that JD Legaspi should have been disqualified from the bidding since there was no showing that it has completed a project worth at least P250 million, or one-half the cost of the proposed project, during the past five years as required by the pre-qualification rules.

Records made available to The STAR showed that the biggest project undertaken so far by JD Legaspi was worth only P93 million.

Efforts to reach former SBPMO chief Arturo Santos for comment failed.

Santos has since retired from the DPWH but maintained a consultancy job with SBPMO.

One of the documents showed that Santos had listed JD Legaspi as number two on his list of 10 pre-qualifiers for the PDMB project despite its lack of track record in the construction of roads and bridges.

A source said it was highly unlikely that JD Legaspi merely omitted to submit documents proving it has undertaken projects worth at least P250 million to qualify for the PDMB bidding.

Meanwhile, opposition Sen. Teresa Aquino-Oreta cast doubt on the claims by PEA officials that the increase in the cost of the PDMB was "aboveboard."

Oreta said the Senate Blue Ribbon Committee investigating the project discovered that the PEA had failed to conduct the necessary soil-boring tests on portions of the road where additional work had been done, an infraction of the governing rules and regulations.