From flagship and centerpiece undertaking to a forgotten and disposable masterplan.

We cannot describe the Aquino administrations’s much-vaunted Public Private Partnership program any other way.

The massive undertaking was supposed to fast-track projects that would forever change the country’s infrastructure and industrial landscape, create jobs, and boost the country’s economic growth and national development.

This grand plan is now but a forgotten dream.

When President Noynoy Aquino delivered his second State-of-the-Nation Address last month, keen political observers wondered why he made no mention at all of the PPP program.

It was not only strange; it was bothersome for prospective investors.

Strange because he made a big deal about the PPP in his first SONA.

Bothersome because it betrayed the President’s indecision and resolve to follow-through an otherwise visionary undertaking that electrified the business community which expressed renewed interest in the country as an investment destination.

It was not a case of failure to launch; it was the lack of “escape velocity” to get off the ground.  

Apparently, the Aquino administration has found it difficult to put the PPP on overdrive, as not a single project has been formally sealed at this point—or more than a year after the first SONA.

One obvious reason for this stumbling block—which officials of the Chambers of Commerce of the United States, the European Union, and Japan have separately pointed out in public fora—is that while foreign business groups are “100-percent behind the PPP,” they worry that Malacañang may possibly change investment rules in midstream, renege on their commitments or cancel existing contracts. 

This is precisely why we need the PPP. It is supposed to encourage the private sector to shell out capital to help the government fund large-scale infrastructure projects.

But how can the Aquino government attract a lot more investors to its PPP program when it has corporate entities like the Bases Conversion and Development Authority?

The BCDA’s  investment partners like the Manila North Tollways Corp.  of tycoon Manny Pangilinan have complained how the BCDA had wanted last-minute changes in the contract involving the Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway project.

It’s a good thing that this was eventually resolved in favor of the Pangilinan group or else many investors would now be looking the other way and scouting for other locations in the region.

Another other striking example of BCDA’s shabby treatment of its business partners is the case of the project to develop Camp John Hay into a special economic zone.

The private developer in the project, the Camp John Hay Development Corp., is now being threatened with legal action by the BCDA supposedly for unpaid rentals totaling P381.8 million.

In fact, CJHDevco stressed that in “a conciliatory gesture of good faith,” it had even submitted a proposal to settle the amount of P381.8 million on a staggered basis, subject to the issuance of all the pending permits that the private company have long been asking from the BCDA.

Under CJHDevco’s sound offer, it would fork over P100 million upfront to BCDA and then pay the balance in instalments over the next six to 12 months.

If this is not a reasonable offer, we do not know wha to call it?