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JUST
level with those who’ll pay the bill. That’s the simple,
rightful request the public makes to authorities, in
light of the confusing twists and turns that have
characterized the government’s position on the
controversial $329-million deal for a Chinese supplier
to set up a national broadband network (NBN).
On
Tuesday, two Cabinet secretaries deepened the
obfuscation with declarations that did little to assure
taxpayers they will benefit from a third broadband
network, this time owned by the state, that was worth
paying a foreign loan for in the next 15 years.
Never
mind that the Chinese loan is, as they keep reminding
us, “concessional” at 3-percent interest. The point is,
no matter how soft a loan, do the people need to
contract it, and is it the only means for financing
available under the circumstances? The answer to both
questions is no.
As so
clearly argued by UP School of Economics professors Raul
Fabella and Emmanuel de Dios in their paper that was
first reported on in BusinessMirror, getting a foreign
loan to fund a third IT backbone should be the last of
this resource-strapped government’s priorities. As the
UP professors noted, two privately owned backbones (PLDT
and Telof) are already existing, and still have excess
capacity. In the IT sector, private business has proven
to be quite aggressive in making the costly investments
for infrastructure, and could be relied on to keep doing
so.
This
penchant for borrowing, “just because” rates are low,
reminds us of the past reminders of former national
treasurer and fiscal expert Leonor Briones, this paper’s
columnist. While the best time to borrow is when rates
are low, it doesn’t mean that one automatically borrows
just because they’re low.
Secretary Leandro Mendoza told Palace reporters on
Tuesday that two conditions have to be met before the
controversial deal with ZTE, the Chinese government’s
handpicked supplier, is perfected: the first, a legal
opinion upholding its validity, was issued last week by
the Department of Justice. The second, the scrutiny of
the financing terms and their approval by the Department
of Finance, is being awaited, according to Secretary
Mendoza.
And
then, as if to assuage already heightened—and
justified—public fears about being shafted again with
another multibillion-peso white elephant, Secretary
Mendoza’s colleague in the Cabinet, Trade and Industry
chief Peter Favila, weighed in.
The
“deal,” said Mr. Favila, has not matured into a contract
yet; what was signed at the sidelines of the Boao
conference in China in April—between Secretary Mendoza
and his Beijing counterpart, with President Arroyo
witnessing—was just a “memorandum of agreement,” saying
the signatories would venture into the project “subject
to conditions.”
For our
edification, he added that once the MOA’s conditions are
met, then that’s when a contract is crafted; “that’s
when you sign a loan agreement, a supply contract and
whatever operative documents are needed.”
Hmm. One
can’t help but wonder whether other “operative”
ingredients had been advanced before, when this
“contract-that-now-is-just-a-MOA” was rushed under the
least-transparent of conditions.
We do
recall that when an assistant secretary in the
Department of Transportation and Communication first
shocked reporters with the revelation that the NBN
project papers were purloined—he was explaining to them
why, until now, no copy of the contract terms has been
made public—he alluded to a “contract.” Later, reports
surfaced that not just one, but two—now they’re
five—contracts had in fact gone “missing,” and the
National Bureau of Investigation has been asked to step
in.
The
second stolen document pertained to cyber-education,
another Chinese loan-funded project, more expensive at
$500 million, and the economic arguments for which the
UPSE professors had also torn to shreds.
So here
we have a case of missing “MOAs” that Secretary Favila
says would be “useless” to the finder because they’re
not perfected contracts; even as the heads of agencies
with a big say in implementing them—the Department of
Education and the National Telecommunications
Commission—are under siege and aggressively rumored to
be on the way out.
Ironic,
isn’t it, that a major ICT project, designed to open
wide people’s access to information and the truth, has
been shrouded in secrecy and dubious explanations from
day one?
Professors Fabella and de Dios had an eloquent way of
zeroing in on the problem: what we lack is not in fiber
optic; it’s in fibre politique—or moral fiber, if you
wish. |
