Ebdane orders contractors, DPWH officials: Correct Halsema Highway slippages

BY DEXTER A SEE

BONTOC, Mountain Province – Visiting Public Works Secretary Hermogenes Ebdane, Jr. ordered contractors of flagship projects of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo in this province and other parts of the Cordillera to institute corrective measures to avoid further delays and negative slippages in the multi-million infrastructure projects funded under the North Luzon Agri-business Quadrangle.

In his two-day visit here and in Baguio City, Ebdane personally conducted an ocular inspection in all the 47 packages of the rehabilitation of three major road networks linking the province with neighboring, Benguet, Ifugao and Kalinga.

Initially, the DPWH quality assurance unit noted several defects in the ongoing implementation of different projects, particularly in the earthmoving and construction activities, coupled with negative slippages in most of the projects.

The President’s priority projects in the region includes the complete rehabilitation of phases II and III of the Baguio-Bontoc-Banaue road, popularly known as the Halsema highway, especially at the Mount Data to Bontoc and Bontoc to Banaue sections and the Bontoc-Tubak-Tuguegarao road.
For this year, the national government released a total of P870 million to fund the initial works for the priority projects which are expected to be completed in the next three years.

It can be recalled that it was Secretary Ebdane who proposed to President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to use local funds instead of acquiring a huge foreign loan to fund the remaining projects of the Halsema highway and the Bontoc-Tabuk-Tuguegarao road during their visit here last December.

For his part, Mariano Alquisa, regional DPWH director, admitted the defects discovered by the agency’s monitoring team could be easily corrected in the course of the project implementation, thus, there is no cause for alarm on the quality of the projects upon completion.

He said such defects are compounded by the regular afternoon rains, thus, negative slippages cannot be avoided.

Alquisa issued an order to all stakeholders to fastrack implementation of all projects so that it could be completed by the end of this year right in time for the release of the funds for the second year of project implementation.

Ebdane ordered all concerned offices of the DPWH to conduct strict supervision and monitoring on the project implementation so that the President would be regularly updated on the status of her ‘pet projects’ in the region.