Panel looks into criminal, civil, administrative liabilities in airport mess
The commission that oversees government-owned and -controlled corporations (GOCCs) is considering filing cases against officials of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) over the New Year’s Day air traffic management fiasco that grounded more than 300 flights and inconvenienced about 65,000 passengers.
The Governance Commission for GOCCs issued this statement as the Department of Transportation (DOTr) formed a five-member team independent of the CAAP that would look into the possible negligence in the closure of Philippine airspace on Jan. 1.
CAAP, being a GOCC attached to the Transportation department, is covered by the GCG.
In a statement Friday, the GCG vowed to evaluate the necessity of filing criminal, civil, or administrative cases against CAAP officials, depending on what several ongoing investigations find.
The commission’s chairman, Alex Quiroz, read the statement before testifying before the Senate committee on public services, which is looking into the fiasco.
Quiroz said the commission would look into the cause of the technical glitch and determine if there was negligence due to a lack of foresight or proper preventive maintenance.
The commission said it would coordinate and work closely with the Senate investigation by providing the necessary resources to determine the root cause of the incident and recommend corrective action for the agency.
Meanwhile, CAAP’s deputy director general for operations, Edgardo Diaz, said the DOTr has formed a body composed of people not connected with the CAAP, to look into the possibility of negligence.
“Our secretary has formed another body composed of non-CAAP personnel which will look into the accountability and possible negligence of our employees,” Diaz said in Filipino on radio dzBB.
Diaz said this was separate from the internal investigation being conducted by the CAAP to identify the root cause of the incident.
“Our investigation within CAAP is focused on identifying the main cause of the incident and why it had happened. We are not that focused on who will be held accountable for this. This probe is to identify our shortcomings, the things that we need to improve and the measures that we should do to prevent another incident like this,” Diaz said.
Senator Grace Poe, who heads the panel investigating the Jan. 1 incident, called for the creation of an independent transportation safety board to investigate similar incidents.
She called into question the credibility of any investigation conducted by the CAAP itself.
Also on Friday, Diaz clarified the CAAP has yet to buy the two new uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for the Communications, Navigation, and Surveillance/Air Traffic Management (CNS/ATM), contrary to what CAAP acting director Manuel Antonio Tamayo told a House briefing earlier this week.
Diaz also said the CAAP was working to install CCTV in the air traffic equipment room.
Meanwhile, Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista said the DOTr was in talks with maintenance providers of the CNS/ATM system to resolve a dispute involving their service contract agreement.
Bautista said that the DOTr has been in discussions with the Sumitomo Corp. – Thales Corp.since September 2022, and adding that it was expediting the resolution of the payment dispute.
Once the dispute has been resolved, Bautista said that they would conduct a feasibility study for the procurement of the CNS/ATM backup and system upgrade to prevent the recurrence of the New Year’s Day incident.
Meanwhile, to address the workforce gap of the air traffic controllers, Bautista expressed support for legislation that would exempt CAAP’s employees from salary standardization to provide better benefits and salaries that are at par with those in the Middle East.
A day after she conducted the Senate hearings on the New Year’s fiasco at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA), Senator Grace Poe told CAAP officials not to be satisfied with band-aid solutions as the safety of all air passengers was at stake.
“We have heard substantially from the CAAP on how the fiasco came to be,” Poe said.
Based on the hearing, Poe said, it was clear that while the CAAP believed it has the people and the equipment to do the job, it fell short in addressing an incident that started with equipment failure.
“But we are not passing judgment yet as we have yet to conclude the Senate probe,” replied Poe in a message when asked about the possible filing of charges against CAAP officials.
She also said she believes a third party maintenance provider should be seriously considered. There also needed to be regular audits of the equipment by experts.
Bautista on Friday said his department is speeding up the privatization of NAIA by completing the terms of reference for the contract.
“We will work to fast-track the privatization of the NAIA, because [it]… remains the primary gateway to the Philippines,” Bautista said.
Privatization, he said, would speed up the modernization and expansion of NAIA.
If it is privatized, NAIA could expand its capacity from handling 40 to 44 aircraft an hour to 50 to 55 aircraft in the same time.
The NAIA rehabilitation and development project aims to alleviate the worsening air traffic congestion at the main gateway and resolve capacity constraints by reconfiguring and renovating facilities and enhancing operation and maintenance.
The rehabilitation project also aims to broaden NAIA’s role as a key economic and tourism driver for Metro Manila and the whole Philippines, deliver capital infrastructure investment to improve the airport’s efficiency and increase its capacity to meet the growing passenger demand from the Philippines and the Asia Pacific region.
