Poe: CAAP almost 100% responsible for NAIA air traffic mess

Days before launching a Senate investigation into the New Year's Day air traffic fiasco at the Ninoy Aquino International Airport, Senator Grace Poe on Monday said she believed that officials of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Philippines (CAAP) were "almost 100 percent" responsible for incident.

"I think the CAAP is almost 100 percent responsible for this because when it comes to the operations of commercial air traffic, the operations and giving of the permits, it's CAAP and [Civil Aeronautics Board], but CAB deals more with the economic aspect and CAAP is the operations," said Poe, chairperson of the Senate public services panel which will launch a probe on the flight disruptions on Thursday, said in an interview on ANC.

"So definitely they're responsible because those are their people that they assigned there to the air traffic control towers," she added.

Despite her views, Poe clarified that she was not particularly blaming the air traffic operators because "a lot of them are very skilled."

Meanwhile, Poe opposed calls for Transportation Secretary Jaime Bautista to resign, saying the latter was just appointed to the post.

"Absolutely not. First of all, Secretary Bautista was just sworn into office, and this is a longstanding situation," she said.

"There are some miscommunications but definitely, the mettle of the leadership of our Secretary of Transportation will be tested now if there should be an impartial investigation of who is truly liable for the fiasco," she added.

The Senate panel had already sent out invitations to Bautista, Manila International Airport Authority (MIAA) General Manager Jose Arturo Tugade, CAAP acting director general Manuel Antonio Tamayo, former Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade, National Security Adviser Clarita Carlos, and representatives of private firms who are in charge of the maintenance of the air traffic control systems, Poe said.

"We’d like to know exactly what caused the power outage. As you mentioned earlier, is it sabotage? Is it cybercrime? Is it human error or just really a failure of the different navigating instruments that we have?" she said.

"What I expect to find out is what they’re doing to prevent something like this from happening again; and who are responsible for it; and what we can do in Congress in terms of our budget efforts to be able to provide the best instruments or whatever we need to ensure the safety of our passengers," she added.

Privatization

Meanwhile, Poe expressed support for the privatization of NAIA, saying the country's main airport could have been rehabilitated during the pandemic if only the government had turned over its operations to a mega consortium that negotiated for it since around 2017 or 2018.

"Not just the air traffic control system but the airport itself. I've always pushed for privatization... Now, if they say that perhaps it's time for this. I believe that it's time for this," she said.

"I think this is the Ayala group, the Aboitiz group, the MVP group. Can you imagine if we awarded it to them in 2018 or 2019, during the pandemic it would have been a downturn for them but they could have rehabilitated the airport easily because there wasn't so much activity during that time," she added.

"It would have been more than, I don't know exactly the figure, P100 billion, it's a staggering amount that they will invest in the facilities of the airport and the terminals, to expand the terminals and the services."

High-risk countries

In the same interview, Poe raised the need for testing passengers from "high-risk countries" for COVID-19 amid the increase in reported infections in China.

"What we are asking the government is just to have a clear-cut regulation of what we are supposed to do with these incoming travelers from China," she said.

"I think that if there is a high-risk country, whether it’s China or another country, we should always have that option to require testing before they come in. The protocol should be in place so that immediately it can be enacted if let’s say you meet a certain threshold or how many percent of your countrymen are actually getting infected, especially if the data coming from certain countries are not transparent or clear. We always have to err on the side of caution when it comes to that," she added.

Last week, Poe said the Philippine government should "decide definitively" on the need for COVID-19 testing for all travelers arriving from China,

"The lack of proactive policies on the matter is concerning amid the rapidly developing situation overseas. Our experience in the past three years of the pandemic has shown that delayed and uninformed COVID-related policies are sometimes more deadly than the pandemic itself,” Poe earlier said.

The Department of Health last Friday said there is no need yet to impose more restrictions on travelers coming from China.

China is experiencing a spike in infections after years of harsh zero-COVID restrictions were loosened in December. — DVM, GMA Integrated News