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MANILA, Philippines – After 5 months of delay, the construction of the new terminal at the Mactan-Cebu International Airport (MCIA) will finally start on June 30.
GMR-Megawide Cebu Airport Corporation (GMCAC) – which is 60% owned by listed Filipino construction company Megawide Construction Corporation and 40% by Bangalore-based GMR Infrastructure Limited – signed in April last year a 25-year concession agreement to manage and upgrade Mactan airport.
As part of the concession agreement, GMCAC will build a new terminal that will increase the airport’s passenger carrying capacity to 12.5 million a year from the current 4.5 million. This facility was originally targeted for completion in February 2018.
The consortium was supposed to start the construction last January 30, but this was moved to June 30 because of the unavailability of the project site.
As agreed with the Mactan-Cebu International Airport Authority, the Philippine Air Force will cede control of the land only after the affected structures are replicated in another part of the airport complex.
Replication, which is being undertaken by winning contractors Granby Construction and A.V. Pamatong Construction, will take around 300 days.
But because of the negotiations between the government and the PAF, GMCAC President Manuel Louie Ferrer told Rappler via text message that his consortium will be able to start a portion of the new terminal on June 30.
“The first parcel of the project land will be available on June 30 and GMCAC will start works related to terminal 2 in that parcel. Grantors and GMCAC have agreed on December 30 as the timeline for handing over the second and final parcel,” Ferrer said.
This was confirmed by Transportation spokesperson Michael Arthur Sagcal, saying in a text message that “90% of the land for the new terminal was turned over last June 1. The rest of the land will be turned over in December 2015, which is also when the construction of the replicated facility will be completed.”
The government’s interim plan will minimize the delay to 6 months from a year, GMCAC’s Ferrer said.
“GMCAC does not need to wait for the replication to be finished,” Sagcal said.
Although he could not give a specific target on when his group will finish the construction of the new terminal, Ferrer said the “construction period for the new terminal is 3 years.”
“Both grantors and GMCAC are working to minimize the impact of this delay. This will not have any impact on GMR or Megawide’s interest towards other PPP projects,” he added.
The actual throughput of the Mactan-Cebu International Airport was 6.9 million passengers in 2013, beyond its design capacity of 4.5 million. The new terminal is seen to address the long queue lines and congestion at the airport.
“For the improvements of the existing facility, renovation is ongoing. It is expected to be done a year after the completion of the Terminal 2,” Ferrer added. – Rappler.com
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