Megawide to bid for P18.7-B dam project of MWSS

Megawide Construction Corp. seeks to widen its infrastructure blueprint by bidding for the P18.72-billion Kaliwa Dam project of the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) under the public-private partnership (PPP) framework.

In a disclosure to the Philippine Stock Exchange Tuesday, Megawide said the dam project—also known as the New Centennial Water Source—would replace the Bulacan bulk water project in its own list of project line-up.

The project involves the financing, design and construction of an additional raw water supply source with a capacity of 600 million liters a day (MLD) through the commissioning of the Kaliwa Dam, including intake facilities and other pertinent facilities. Likewise part of the project is a water conveyance system with a design capacity of 2,400 MLD in anticipation of additional inflows from Laiban Dam, which is upstream of the Kaliwa Dam.

The project will be awarded to a private sector partner under a 30-year concession period under a build-transfer structure.

Megawide recently raised P4 billion from the issuance of 40 million non-voting perpetual preferred shares at P100 each.

The preferred shares would be listed on the Philippine Stock Exchange today.

Michael Cosiquien, Megawide chair, said the option to upsize the preferred shares offering by another P3 billion was not exercised because the company deemed that the P4 billion fresh fund-raising was sufficient for the company’s requirements at present. Doris C. Dumlao