What’s
happening to the system of Department of Transportation and Communications? It
seems that the business sectors doesn’t want to work with them. Recently, the
agency declared that their bidding process for the 2.2 billion maintenance
contract of the MRT3 was postponed because their potential bidders didn’t pass
their proposals. Hernando Cabrera, spokesperson of the DOTC said that they will
make some revisions to the contract they made to attract companies to join in bidding
process. He also said, they estimated that they would finish the revision before
the end of the year.
The
private companies said that the contract is very unfair for them because the DOTC
imposed to pay a huge amount if they make any mistakes to their maintenance
service.There is a tendency that Sec. Jun Abaya would blame them although the
transit is already aging like what he did in MRT mishap that happened last
August. He said that what the caused of accident was due to the negligence of
the MRT driver and not because of mismanagement of the government.
We
should not surprise why the DOTC experienced a
failed bidding for the maintenance of the MRT. Maybe the potential
bidders realized that it is not worth it to handle that such kind of project. It
is possible that they may lose because of the penalty that the DOTC wants to
impose. Maybe they also felt that in the end, the current secretary would not give
the right support to execute their job smoothly. As what they saw, Sec. Abaya
is very busy from acting as a promoter for the presidential bid of his ally DILG
Sec. Mar Roxas. Yeah, 2016 is very near, but he should focus his attention to develop
our train system. It is not the right time to involved in politics. There are
many problems that the DOTC should fix to lessen the burden of the commuters. Don’t
mimic the acts of some of the allies of P-Noy administration who are very busy
from attacking their enemies in politics rather than to perform their job
effectively. It is obvious that they just want to look clean although they have
their own dirt on their face.
At
least, the DOTC already learned their lesson. In previous years, they were not
undergo in bidding process when they chose their own maintenance provider. If
we remember, Fil-Estate head and former MRT chief Roberto Sobrepena accused the
DOTC for violating their BLT agreement which stating that only the MRTC has the
right to choose any bidder for the development projects in MRT3. Bob Sobrepena emphasized
that the government didn’t follow the rule when they hired the services of PhilTrams
and the APT Global which until now is still working as their maintenance
provider. If the government would not find a new maintenance provider, of
course, they don’t have any choice except APT Global. We already knew that they
are not sufficient with their service. So, why would you continue to hire them?
This is not a problem for the DOTC because they are treating them as an ally
compare their relationship with MRTC which is as cold as a stone. MRTC is the
owner of MRT3 and they are under of MRT Holdings which is composed of different
private companies.
The
government should find an expert maintenance provider. They should not base
their decision with the price, but look to the capability of the company. If
they need to increase their offering price, do it to attract the companies to
bid. Of course, they should only limit their budget. What I mean to say is make
a win-win solution, both for the government and to the maintenance provider. They
should also consult to the owner of MRT3 before they make a final decision.
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