BY RAYMOND AFRICA and WENDELL VIGILIA
THE Senate Committee on Public Services will open next week its investigation into the air traffic control system glitch that crippled the operations of the Ninoy Aquino International Airport (NAIA) on January 1, Sen. Grace Poe announced yesterday.
Poe, who is the chairperson of the lead committee that will lead the probe, said the first hearing will be held on January 12 once airport operations have normalized.
“We can conduct hearings even during the break. I intend to call for a hearing on Thursday, Jan. 12, allowing CAAP (Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines) and DOTr (Department of Transportation) to normalize airport operations before conducting a hearing. By that time, key executives should not have an excuse not to attend,” Poe said.
Congress is still on a holiday break and is set to resume regular sessions only on January 23. Senate rules allow committees to hold public hearings even if Congress is on break.
Four resolutions have been filed at the Senate seeking an inquiry into the malfunction that hit the country’s air traffic management system on New Year’s Day.
In an advisory issued Wednesday night, Senate majority leader Joel Villanueva said the committee on public services will hold the hearing on the NAIA incident on January 12 at 1:30 p.m. jointly with the committee on civil service and committee on finance. The hearing will also tackle Senate Bill No. 1003 or an Act Strengthening the CAAP, and Senate Bill No. 1121 or an Act Creating the Philippine Transportation Safety Board.
Villanueva said Poe and Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri have been coordinating with concerned government agencies, directing them to prepare for the Senate investigation “without affecting the normal operations of our airports.”
Hundreds of flights were either cancelled, diverted, and delayed and more than 65,000 passengers were affected after the primary and secondary power supplies at the NAIA failed to operate on the morning of January 1.
The power supplies glitch was followed by a power surge which led to the loss of communication, radio, radar, and internet after the equipment providing uninterrupted power supply to two NAIA terminals suddenly went offline and failed to connect to the backup commercial power supply of the Manila Electric Company.
At the House, San Jose del Monte City Rep. Florida Robes filed House Resolution No. 672 urging the House committee on good government to conduct an inquiry in aid of legislation into the airspace shutdown.
Robes said she wants to know from transportation officials how the new communications, navigation and surveillance (CNS/ARM) system, which was loaned from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), malfunctioned despite its inauguration in 2018 and with local funding from the government.
“Given the funding, from loan and the government, implementation and proper maintenance of the new CNS/ARM system, regular audit and assessment of its capability, the shutdown and substantial risks to national security could have been prevented and avoided, thousands of flight passengers would not have nee stranded and inconvenienced and there should have been no substantial loss to the tourism and aviation industries during New Year’s Day of 2023,” the resolution said.
She said there was also lack of coordination between the CAAP and the MIAA with the airlines, “as well as lack of concern for air passengers on a tight budget (who) wanted or needed to go home or those who needed to return to work outside the country.”
Robes noted that the new CNS/ATM was a product of a JICA loan ID PH-P228 with loan title New Communications, Navigation and Surveillance/Air Traffic Management Systems Project between the Philippines and Japanese governments, through the then Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) on March 28, 2002 with effectivity date on February 21, 2003 amounting to ¥22,049 million.
However, the new CNS/ATM was inaugurated only on January 16, 2018, while Department of Budget and Management (DBM) records show that government continued to receive the loan package even in 2021.
Robes said local counterpart funding for the project happened in 2017 worth P9.8 billion for the “construction of airports and navigational facilities, and acquisition of navigational equipment as stated in paragraph 6 of the General Appropriations Act (GAA).”
She said the local funding for the new CNS/ATM project was worth P122,273,000 in 2017.
The lawmaker said the House probe will also focus on the maintenance of the new CNS/ATM system, as well as presence or absence of a back-up or contingency plan, stressing that airspace monitoring also involves national security and tourism.
“It has an impact on investor confidence. There should be foresight in predicting situations such as the power outage. The resolution is not limited to the UPS or uninterruptible power supply,” she said.
CYBERATTACKS
Sen. Risa Hontiveros said the Senate probe should zero-in on the vulnerability of the country’s air traffic control system to cyberattacks.
“While the DOTr has apparently ruled out sabotage, the breakdown of both the primary and secondary source of power throws into question the capacity our air traffic control system to withstand cyberattacks and hacking and exposes our vulnerability to such hostile incursions,” Hontiveros said in filing Senate Resolution No. 401 on Wednesday.
“What is mind boggling is that despite the fact that government officials had known that the outdated air control system of the Philippines’ main gateway to the world was in danger of conking out any time and this issue was supposedly already raised at a Cabinet meeting, no concrete plans had been made for the upgrade or improvement,” she added.
Hontiveros said the private contractor in-charge of the CNS/ATM of the CAAP should also be grilled to determine “whether there was a violation of the performance guarantee as may possibly be seen through an examination of documents from the Commission on Audit in the past years…”.
She said the panel should also look into the “brewing allegations” of funding delays and alleged corruption in the establishment of the CNS/ATM system and the reported long interval between the initial negotiations in February 2010 and the inauguration in 2018 “and how it may have impacted on air control operations.”
“Given these competing claims, a thorough investigation must be undertaken to identify both the proximate and the contributory causes of the incident, determine liabilities of government officials and private contractors, and ensure that measures are in place to prevent similar — or worse — scenario in the future,” she said.
CAAP FUNCTIONS
Northern Samar Rep. Paul Daza raised the need to separate the regulatory and commercial functions of the CAAP.
CAAP was created through Republic Act 9497 of 2008, or “An Act Creating the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines, Authorizing the Appropriation of Funds Therefor, and for Other Purposes.”
Daza said the agency’s functions include both commercial and regulatory functions, potentially creating a conflict of interest.
Section 21 of RA 9497 stipulates that CAAP is tasked with both the “development and utilization of the air potential of the Philippines” and “regulation of air transportation.”
It also enjoys fiscal autonomy (Section 15) and exemption from taxes, customs, and tariff duties in the importation of equipment, machineries, and other materials.
Daza said reforming the CAAP will require filing of certain bills to “officially decouple the regulatory and developmental functions of the agency.”
“The CAAP must be enhanced to focus on being a regulatory body, while two other operational and independent investigative agencies must be created to perform the mentioned functions. The same also needs to be applied to maritime regulatory agencies such as the PPA (Philippine Ports Authority),” he said.
MIGRANT WORKERS
Sen. Raffy Tulfo asked airline companies to give special airfare rates to affected overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) who want to return to the country after reports said that airfares have increased due to demand-based algorithm after the January 1 technical glitch.
Tulfo said Philippine Airlines and Cebu Pacific should consider giving “preferential pricing” to affected OFWs since the money that will be used to pay the pricey plane tickets can instead be brought home by the overseas workers to spend for their needs.
He said he got information that a one-way flight from Manila to Japan now costs P90,000 to P140,000 when it was only priced at around P40,000 before the malfunction of the air traffic control system.
“It would be unfair for our OFWs to absorb the fault or negligence of CAAP for the maintenance of their CNS/ATM system. Marami sa kanila isang beses lang o mas malimit pa makauwi sa isang taon. Yung pera sana sa pangsalubong o di kay pang suporta sa pamilya ay pilitang napunta na lang sa pamasahe
(Many OFWs are not given the chance to go home every year. The money that they will bring home to support their family will just go to pay the airfare),” Tulfo said.
Tulfo said he has also coordinated with the Department of Migrant Workers to possibly subsidize the discounted airfares of the affected OFWs.
The DMW said all OFWs affected by flight delays and cancellations since Sunday will be deployed by January 7.
In a televised public briefing, DMW Undersecretary Hans Leo Cacdac said they have learned that the latest date of rebooked flights involving stranded OFWs will take place on January 7.
“Currently, there are no more OFW flights needing to be rebooked. The last ones were really those set by January 6 or 7,” he said.
While stranded OFWs wait for their rebooked flights, Cacdac assured that the DMW and Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) are prepared to provide continued accommodation to stranded OFWs.
“They can be accommodated until their rebooked flights. For now, they are in hotels waiting for their rebooked flights,” he said, adding: “They already have flight schedules. We are just waiting for their actual date of flights.”
COURT EMPLOYEES
Court employees affected by the January 1 air traffic management glitch who got stranded in their provinces would not be deemed absent if they can present confirmed flight booking before January 3, the Supreme Court said yesterday.
In a memorandum order, Acting Chief Justice Marvic Leonen said what happened is beyond the control of the employees.
“In view of this, court employees who were unable to report for work in their respective stations on or before January 9, 2023 shall not be considered absent, provided that they can show that they had a confirmed flight booking that should have brought them to their assigned stations before January 3, 2023,” Leonen said.
Aside from this, he said employees should have requested “an immediate rebooking after the technical issue occurred on January 1, 2023 but were not accommodated” and “they reported for work the next workday upon their arrival.” — With Gerard Naval and Ashzel Hachero
