Wait a minute, I smell something fishy in this Panglao Int'l Airport deal.
I am just bothered by the statement made by MIAA General Manager Alfonso Cusi that the bulk of the funding--or about 72% of the total 4.2 billion budget for the airport--will be sourced from Lucio Tan's PAL's payables to MIAA.
My reaction stems from a report by
Bohol Chronicle as follows: "Cusi has committed that the P3 billion payables of the Philippine Airlines (PAL) to MIAA will form part of its corporate funds to be spent for the Panglao airport."
So we have already upturned and bulldozed Panglao's terrain on the premise that Lucio Tan will indeed come up with the hard cash in time for its scheduled completion in 2010. And that's barely two years!
If I remember correctly, PAL's cash flow is certainly cause for concern--what with declining passenger traffic and downgrade of MIAA's aviation safety ratings.
The last time I flew from Mactan to Narita, you could certainly seat two giant elephants in the economy class and a whale in the Mabuhay class that was less than half-occupied. (And golly, they insisted on making me pay for 10 kg of excess luggage!)
If Lucio Tan really has the money, he should have dispensed with the disgraceful publicity by just paying the BIR bills he is still contesting and should have retrieved his airplanes faster when they were seized by the international creditors in the US just a few years back.
Malambot na nga ang limestone foundation ng Panglao, mukhang sasandal pa tayo sa hangin ng PAL.
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