Anxiety pervades at Clark as lawmakers decide ecozone’s fate

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga — Anxiety pervades at the Clark special economic zone as a bicameral committee decides today what stakeholders here have described as a "zoom or doom" scenario for them.

A contingent from the Clark Development Corp. (CDC), the Clark Investors and Locators Association (CILA) and other local groups is attending today’s hearing of the bicameral panel at the Senate building to lobby for a "freeport status quo" for the Clark ecozone.

CDC employees have been holding daily prayer vigils since last week amid apprehensions that the state-run firm would be abolished.

Their fears stemmed from Senate Bill 2260 which proposes to place some 2,200 hectares of the 4,400-hectare ecozone under the Philippine Export Zone Authority (PEZA) and the other half — covering the Diosdado Macapagal International Airport (DMIA) — under a Clark freeport authority.

Under the present setup, the CDC manages and operates 2,200 hectares of the ecozone, while its subsidiary, the Clark International Airport Corp. (CIAC), takes care of the 2,200-hectare aviation complex, including the airport.

For CILA president Frankie Villanueva, the final version of SB 2260 would spell the "zoom or doom" of the Clark ecozone.

He said House Bill 5064 almost retains Clark’s present status, while SB 2260 exempts public utilities, tourism firms and industrial park operators from tax incentives.

"This means many of the investors will be charged more for electricity and water and have to cut down on their expenses. This could mean layoffs," he said.

Initially, SB 2260, filed by Sen. Ralph Recto, sought a status quo at Clark, but its final version accommodated the PEZA takeover and the creation of a freeport authority, as proposed by Sen. Serge Osmeña.

Despite this, Recto, however, told The STAR that hundreds of CDC employees are assured of their jobs regardless of the outcome of the congressional deliberations.

"I assure them (CDC employees) that none of them will be dislocated," he said.

Still, Recto said that while Osmeña has so far stood pat on his proposition, other senators in the bicameral panel, particularly Sen. Richard Gordon, are batting for a freeport status for the entire ecozone.

"I don’t know yet the stand of Senators Mar Roxas and Loi Ejercito," he said, but expressed confidence that the bicameral committee would eventually settle for the status quo.

He said majority of the bicameral committee members seemed to share his proposal for a "freeport status quo" for the entire 4,400-hectare ecozone.

At present, Clark investors pay only five percent of their gross income earned (GIE) to the government, instead of the usual national and local taxes. They are also exempt from import and other duties.

HB 5064 provides tax incentives not only to companies at the 4,400-hectare main ecozone, but also to those at the 29,000-hectare Clark sub-zone which has remained largely undeveloped.

The House bill is similar to what Recto and Gordon have been batting for in the bicameral committee.

The bicameral panel earlier reconciled House Bill 4900 and Senate Bill 2259 granting a one-time tax amnesty to Clark investors.

The bills were filed after the Supreme Court, in its July 2005 decision, ruled that investors at Clark and other former US military facilities turned into ecozones are not entitled to tax privileges, saying that Republic Act 7227 or the Bases Conversion Law mentions only the Subic Freeport.

The tribunal affirmed its decision "with finality" last December.