MIAA not liable for aborted Bohol airport project – CA

MANILA, Philippines — The Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) is not obliged to pay P386 million in damages for the aborted Panglao Airport project in Bohol, according to the Court of Appeals.

The CA’s 13th Division reversed and set aside a resolution handed down in August 2018 by the Pasay City Regional Trial Court, which ordered the MIAA to pay P386 million in actual and compensatory damages to the First United-Blue Star joint venture.

The appellate court dismissed an order of the Pasay court issued in February 2019, denying MIAA’s motion for reconsideration.

The cost of actual and compensatory damages represented the consortium’s “forgone rental income for equipment, overhead costs and forgone profit.”

The First United Constructors Corp. and the Blue Star Construction and Development Corp. asked the Pasay court to reconsider MIAA’s decision in 2010, which disqualified the joint venture from implementing the Panglao-Bohol Airport project for supposed failure to meet certain requirement.

The MIAA’s former lead agency, the Department of Transportation and Communications (now the Department of Transportation), canceled the Panglao Airport project and replaced it with the New Bohol Airport Development project, which was implemented by the DOTr with funding assistance from the Japan International Cooperation Agency.

The project was completed in November 2018.

The Pasay court said MIAA’s acts caused losses to the joint venture, noting the equipment allotted for the project remained unavailable for other uses since the submission of bids until the project was canceled.

The CA rejected the lower court’s ruling, saying the joint venture was deemed to have accepted MIAA’s right to reject any and all bids or to annul the bidding process at any time prior to the award of the contract without financial liability.