Senate majority leader Joel Villanueva and Senators Ramon Revilla Jr. and Jose “Jinggoy” Estrada yesterday filed separate resolutions urging the appropriate committee to conduct an inquiry on the supposed technical glitch that affected the country’s Air Traffic Management system on New Year’s Day and come up with measures to improve the Philippines’ overall air traffic services.
Senate Resolution Nos. 390, 391, and 392 were filed by Villanueva, Revilla, and Estrada, respectively, after the January 1 incident crippled air traffic at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) and the country’s other airports.
“Failure to address airspace traffic management will likewise continuously impact the facilitation of domestic trade and seamless business transactions due to, among others, delayed shipment of cargo via air. Based on statistics from the Civil Aeronautics Board as of November 16, 2022, cargo chargeable weights for January to September 2022 reached 35,084,571 kilograms,” Villanueva said in his resolution.
He said the country’s airspace traffic management system needs to be upgraded to prevent future flight suspensions which will affect the tourism industry.
Quoting Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista, Villanueva said the present airspace traffic management system was first introduced in 2018 at a cost of P10.8 billion “and will need to be improved or modernized to a better system.”
He said upgrading the country’s airspace traffic management system will strike off the Philippines in the list of worst international airports since the NAIA has been regarded as the worst international airport for three consecutive years from 2011 to 2014, fourth worst in the world in 2014, and fifth worst in the world in 2016 “which affected both the airport and the country’s reputation to travelers.”
Sen. Grace Poe, chairperson of the Senate committee on public services, has filed a proposed measure in August last year for the creation of the Philippine Airports Authority that will focus on planning, construction, and operations of airports.
Poe said the proposed measure seeks to unburden the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) of the task of regulating what it operates since most of the country’s more than 80 airports — except NAIA, the Clark International Airport, and the Mactan-Cebu International Airport — are under its operational and supervisory control pursuant to RA 9497.
“CAAP is supposed to juggle different and conflicting roles within the aviation sector. For one, CAAP is required to establish and operate airports and is likewise tasked to plan, develop, construct, and operate new airports in line with relevant government agencies. At the same time, it is also responsible for the regulation of the same, including the power to inspect the said facilities and to investigate any violations of the rules and regulations pertaining thereto. Evidently, CAAP regulates what it operates, which lessens its effectivity both as a regulatory agency and as an operator,” Poe said in her explanatory note.
She said to “untangle” CAAP’s conflicting functions, there is a need to create the Philippine Airports Authority “with its raison d’etre to establish, construct, develop, and effectively manage and operate airports in the country up to par with international standards for air transportation and aviation safety.”
TAGAYTAY FACILITY
Sen. Francis Tolentino said he has received information indicating that CAAP’s facility in Tagaytay City, which sends out signals to flights approaching NAIA, was functioning normally amid the chaos at the country’s main international and domestic airport on New Year’s Day.
He said the information was captured on video.
“Habang nangyayari po sa Maynila, sa NAIA, pinapuntahan ko ‘yung CAAP radar sa Tagaytay para sa ganoon po eh ma-check ko kung mayroong abnormality nga. So, normal po doon pero talagang malungkot dahil first day of the year eh maraming hindi makabalik sa NAIA (I ordered someone to visit the CAAP radar in Tagaytay City to check if there are abnormalities while the issue is happening in Manila in NAIA. So, it turned out to be normal [there in Tagaytay City] and it is sad that many [flights] cannot return to NAIA on the first day of the year),” Tolentino told dzRH.
“Sabi nung mga tao roon eh nakatanggap lang sila ng abiso doon sa ATMC na nagkaroon ng fluctuation (The people there said that they received an advisory from the ATMC [Air Traffic Management Center] that there was fluctuation [in power supply],” he added.
He said CAAP should explain in the upcoming Senate inquiry what really transpired on New Year’s Day.
“What really happened?… Yung mga paliparan po sa ibang bansa — sa Ukraine — kahit may digmaan eh nagagamit pa ho yung iba. So, dapat talagang maimbestigahan ito (What really happened?… Airports in other countries like the ones in Ukraine, have been in use even amid the war. So, we really need to investigate this),” Tolentino said.
Sen. Joseph Victor Ejercito said vital utilities like the NAIA should not be privatized after Bautista said that the Marcos administration is pursuing the privatization of the airport.
“NAIA privatization will not be good…We should already learn our mistakes from the past.
Several vital utilizes that were privatized like the Napocor (National Power Corp.) plants, NGCP (National Grid Corporation of the Philippines), sold National Steel Corporations, Fort Bonifacio. What has the country earned from it?” Ejercito said in mixed Filipino and English.
He said vital utilities should be owned by the government even as he said that the NAIA technical glitch should be an eye-opener that in an instance, the country’s air traffic can be paralyzed.
He said instead of privatization, vital facilities should be under government control.
Former Sen. Panfilo Lacson said the upcoming Senate inquiry in the technical issue can focus on a report that former Transportation Secretary Art Tugade spent the more than P13 billion for the modernization of CAAP to aesthetics at the NAIA.
“Stupidity or greed? If reports are accurate that the budget appropriated by Congress for the setup of redundancies in the air traffic control system was diverted to some beautification projects at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, those responsible should spend their next holiday season in jail,” Lacson said in a statement.
Lacson made the remark after an online news report said that Tugade allegedly spent the P13 billion funds for the backup system of the country’s air traffic control on beautification projects at the NAIA, including the installation of electronic billboards and concreting of parking spaces outside the air terminals.
“Incidentally, the DOTr is one of the departments with the worst underspending records year end and year out. The P13 billion must have been part of their unspent appropriations declared as savings then realigned. I hope Sen. Grace Poe’s committee can look more deeply into the history of that particular appropriation,” Lacson said.
STRANDED WORKERS
As flight cancellations and delays continued to hound the NAIA, the Department of Migrant Workers (DMW) yesterday ordered all recruitment and manning agencies to come to the aid of their respective overseas Filipino workers (OFWs).
In its Advisory No. 01-2023, DMW Secretary Susan Ople directed Private Recruitment Agencies (PRAs) and Licensed Manning Agencies (LMAs) to extend all the necessary assistance to their stranded recruits.
“In light of the recent flight disruption at the NAIA, all private recruitment agencies and licensed manning agencies are hereby instructed to monitor and assist affected OFWs,” said Ople, adding: “All forms of assistance extended to OFWs are highly appreciated.”
In addition, the DMW chief ordered PRAs and LMAs to coordinate with the waiting employers of the affected OFWs “in explaining the cause of such delays… to ensure that workers’ employments are secure and unaffected.”
Lastly, the DMW said recruitment and manning agencies are mandated to inform the government on the conditions of their respective OFWs.
“PRAs and LMAs are directed to submit the necessary reports on affected workers at the soonest possible time,” said Ople.
Meanwhile, the PNP instructed its Aviation Security Group to extend assistance to passengers who remain stranded at the NAIA.
In a statement, the PNP said it has also instructed the Southern Police District to help in the management of vehicular and pedestrian traffic control.
“While civil aviation authorities continue working to restore normal flight operations at the NAIA following a glitch in the air traffic management system, the PNP Aviation Security Group has been instructed to extend utmost assistance to affected passengers who remain stranded in the NAIA terminals,” the PNP said.
If necessary, the PNP said support units such as the Explosive and Ordnance Disposal/K9 Group, Health Service, and Police Community Affairs and Development Group “may be called upon to provide augmentation and operational support.”
It said that “security and order at the NAIA remains to be the primary concern in our law enforcement and public safety operations.”
“Unattended luggage and influx of stranded passengers at the airport terminals are red flag situations that will prompt our security personnel to take appropriate action to ensure public safety,” it added.
‘PAY AFFECTED PASSENGERS’
Albay Rep. Joey Salceda said the government should compensate passengers whose flights were either cancelled or delayed because of the technical glitch.
Salceda likewise urged the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) to certify the air traffic management system power issue as a “safety reason” for flight cancellations to allow passengers with cancelled flights to be eligible for reimbursement.
“It’s the least the DOTR and the CAAP can do, at this point,” Salceda said. “So, I’m asking my friend (Transportation) Secretary (Jaime) Bautista to look into how the CAAP can compensate passengers hassled by these delays.”
Beyond policy changes, Salceda said “we need to hold some people accountable, too, so this never happens again.”
“I mean, I can’t say this is force majeure. You can foresee power outages. You can foresee surges in air traffic. Someone was at fault here,” said the chair of the House committee on ways and means.
Salceda explained that the 2012 joint administrative order (JAO) No. 1 between the then Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) and the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) provides that: “In case the air carrier cancels the flight because of force majeure, safety and/or security reasons, as certified by the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, a passenger shall have the right to be reimbursed for the full value of the fare.”
Since it was clearly the fault of the government and not of the airlines, Salceda said many passengers were unable to avail of basic compensation and accommodation packages such as free hotel rooms.
“The JAO apparently does not have a provision for when it’s clearly the fault of the administrative agencies,” he said. “So the least the CAAP can do is certify this event as a safety reason for cancellation, so that the reimbursement mechanism can be set into motion.”
The glitch affected 66,000 passengers and assuming that they will be paid P10,000 each, the government will have to cough up a total of P660 million.
“Passengers pay a terminal fee, and airlines pay fees to the CAAP. They failed both sectors, in this case. And there’s a real financial damage to both passengers and airlines as a result of this failure,” Salceda said.
Salceda said the system-wide issue, “which is bad enough as it is, and terrible considering the rush to get back to work after the Holidays, should never happen again.”
The administration lawmaker also raised the need for the DOTR to look into JAO No. 1 to possibly amend it, saying, “I don’t think JAO 1 took it (technical glitch) into account, either.”
“There is a clear need to update or change policies to reflect what passengers are entitled to when the government is at fault. There’s also a need to see whether the failure could have been avoided had the CAAP complied faithfully with, say, the State Safety Program for air operations,” he said. — With Gerard Naval, Victor Reyes and Wendell Vigilia
