Army eng’g brigade tapped for Clark airport ramp work

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga — Giant equipment of the Army’s 51st Engineering Brigade has started to crack up the 14-inch thick concrete airport ramp built by the US military here as part of a P250-million rehab project making it capable of absorbing the impact of large aircraft expected here by 2005.

Officials of the Clark Development Corp. (CDC) tapped the 51st Engineering Brigade to do the work amid alleged delaying tactics by three CDC board directors who had nominated contractors who failed to qualify to undertake the project.

Top CDC officials, however, declined to comment on the controversy.

The project, funded by a P250-million loan from the Philippine Veterans Bank, was supposed to start early last month for target completion in April in time for the landing of wide-bodied aircraft of the United Parcels Service (UPS), which began operations at this special economic zone last year.

According to a CDC source, the three board directors had complained that the project’s pre-qualification board had imposed "too stringent" qualifications on contractors.

Work on the four-hectare western ramp of the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) and the clearing of the debris would have been awarded to a private contractor.

CDC officials, however, decided to finally seek the help of the Army’s 51st Engineering Brigade to make up for the delay.

The replacement of the concrete ramp, however, would be done by only a single contractor according to standards of the Canada-based International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).

Douglas Yballe, CDC vice president for operations, said five contractors with experience in airport construction made it to the pre-qualification level.

"We, however, were questioned on the failure to post the bidding of the project on (an Internet) website as prescribed by Executive Order 40. We don’t have a website, so we used the website of the Department of Budget and Management and later ended up pre-qualifying seven firms," Yballe said.

Emmanuel Angeles, CDC president and chief executive officer, expressed "relief" over the start of the project and thanked the 51st Engineering Brigade, headed by Brig. Gen. Francisco Bravo, for agreeing to remove the ramp’s concrete to pave the way for the upgrading.

Bienvenido Manga, DMIA general manager, said only one contractor experienced in airport construction should build the new airport ramp or apron.

"It’s a costly project. If it turns out wrong in any way, the ICAO would not (grant an) international standards certification and we would have to start all over again," he said.

Yballe added, "Constructing roads is far different from constructing an airport ramp."

The US Air Force built the ramp primarily for military aircraft.