Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista on Monday clarified that the planned privatization of NAIA covers only its operations and not its assets. | NCorralesINQ /PDI
Asked about these statements, the President said “We have no plans to privatize anything.”
“There’s no plan to privatize anything. Rather we do the opposite,” he said. “They cannot own the airport. A private firm cannot own the airport.”He recalled his trip to New York in September last year when he met with representatives of a company that runs several big airports, like Gatwick Airport in the United Kingdom.
“[We were] asking them what can they do, can they come in and help us so that we can increase the traffic through the Manila airport? And they said they could,” the president said, adding that officials from that company, which he did not name, were in the country last week “to look [into] the operations of the airport” following its shutdown on Jan. 1.
Marcos said further: “And they say that, without changing anything, without changing — without new equipment, without building a new runway, that they can increase the traffic from what is presently… they refer to as 35 movements per hour, to up to 45 movements per hour without changing anything.”Commenting on Marcos’ interview, Bautista said at the Palace briefing: “What the president meant was that we will not give the Naia assets to the private sector.
“At the same time, he wants us to fast-track the maintenance agreement with Sumitomo and Thales who [is] the provider of the system,” he said further, referring to the joint venture being planned for NAIA between the Japanese electric services firm and the French digital company.—WITH A REPORT FROM JANE BAUTISTA
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