PPP bidders given more time to change lineup
The transportation department is giving bidders for the P17.5-billion Mactan-Cebu international airport additional time to submit documents related to applications to change their consortium members and the required licenses of their nominated construction contractors.
A general bid bulletin issued by the Department of Transportation and Communications showed that those documents should be submitted by Aug. 15, two weeks before the submission of bid proposals on Aug. 28. The previous deadline has been set on July 30.
The Mactan-Cebu project will be the first airport public-private partnership (PPP) deal to be auctioned by the Aquino administration. The government is seeking private sector support to expand, rehabilitate and operate the project for a period of 20 years.
The DOTC has prequalified seven local groups, which have teamed up with foreign operators, in April. Participating in the bidding are MPIC-JGS Consortium, a venture between businessman Manuel Pangilinan’s Metro Pacific Investments Corp. and Gokongwei-led JG Summit Holdings; AAA Airport Partners, a venture between Ayala Corp. and Aboitiz Equity Ventures; Gotinanun-led Filinvest Development Corp.; San Miguel Corp.; Lopez-led First Philippine Holdings, Henry Sy’s Premier Airport Group and Megawide Construction Corp.
The PPP project involves the construction of a new world-class international passenger terminal building with a capacity of about eight million passengers a year. The Mactan-Cebu international airport has an annual capacity of 4.5 million passengers. However, it already booked about 6.77 million passengers in 2012.
The DOTC earlier required the bidders to tap experienced foreign operating partners to address their lack of airport operations expertise.
MPIC-JGS tapped Aeroports de Lyon, AAA partnered with Houston Airport System, Filinvest-CAI signed up Singapore’s Changi Airport Saudi Ltd. while San Miguel-Incheon is bringing in Incheon International Airport Corp. First Holdings tapped Wellington International Airport Ltd., NZ Airports Ltd.and Infantil Ltd.
