Unreasoning

“CONSPICUOUSLY ABSENT during the groundbreaking ceremony was Clark Development Corp. President-CEO Arthur P. Tugade.”

So reported the astute Ashley Manabat on the launch of the multi-million-dollar AeroPark Campus at the Global Gateway Logistics City (GGLC) property in the Clark Freeport Wednesday of last week.

Tugade had the best reason for his absence: He was at the Marriott in Pasay City receiving the Asia CEO Award’s Executive Leadership Team won by CDC, and his consolation prize as finalist in the Global Filipino Executive of the Year.

Methinks a deeper, if dubious, unreason for the Tatalonian Toughie’s nonappearance: Capilion.

Strange, if not illogical, (dis)connection? Read on.

One. The CDC has praise released Capilion’s Clark Green Frontier (CGF) as the biggest single investment – at a reported P7 billion – that came to the Freeport under Tugade’s incumbency. The only one, controversial at that, his critics would readily smirk.

AeroPark, with $150 million – P7.065 million at the current exchange rate of $1:P47.10 – is already, if slightly, bigger than Capilion. The enormous difference though coming with AeroPark being but a part of GGLC, “a major real estate development that will entail the investment of over $3 billion in new facilities…” While CGF is all there is to Capilion, Tugade aside.

Two. The Capilion project – per CDC’s Q&A shit, er, sheet – “will cover the development of two commercial buildings, covering (sic) a total floor area of 43,151.04 square meters. Date of project completion unspecified.

AeroPark will have “five office towers with a gross floor area of 142,000 square meters. Expected to be completed in 24 months or in 2017.” 

Three. Capilion has apparently finished trimming trees and digging at its CGF site, so called green – per CDC – for “the implementation of …Green Buildings that are in response to calls to help save the environment.” What, how, why green, the CDC Q&A did not give any inkling.

The day after the groundbreaking, AeroPark initiated “mobilization…for the construction of Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certified facilities whose spatial offerings and amenities will once again change the landscape of Clark and the surrounding area.” With LEED, AeroPark’s “greenness” needed no explanation.

AeroPark further sayeth all its five buildings would be certified “Grade A.”

Four. The Capilion project is bruited about to “initially employ 18,000 workers, and when it reaches its full capacity, about 75,000 jobs would be created.”

At the groundbreaking rites, Gov. Lilia G. Pineda expressed her delight over the 10,000 workers needed for the first phase of AeroPark, which when completed is seen to “generate employment opportunities to over 300,000 workers with $600 million in annual payroll for entry-level employees alone.”

In four out of four, AeroPark takes the thunder out of Capilion, leaving its drumbeater Tugade simply beat. And then one more.

Five. The Capilion project – principally because of its location – roused vehement opposition from the Angeles City council, the advocacy group Pinoy Gumising Ka Movement, traffic watchers, and local businessmen.

AeroPark – principally because of its location – has generated enthusiastic  support from local government leaders, notably Governor Pineda and Mayor Ed Paminutan, Clark advocates and business groups. (Speaking of Pamintuan, hizzoner has been uncharacteristically quiet on Capilion, giving rise to speculative, if malicious, talks of some “Bedan conspiracy” between CDC and city hall.) 

It is precisely that very location of AeroPark – the expansive GGLC property – that Capilion oppositors are suggesting as transfer site for its CGF, to free the Freeport from the traffic gridlocks it is expected to cause at its designated site by the very entrance to Clark.

Which Tugade cannot cause, GGLC being out of his CDC domain, located as it is in the civil aviation area administered and managed by Clark International Airport Corp. President-CEO Dino Tanjuatco.

Which Tugade will not. Else losing to CIAC the credit for effecting the P7-billion investment.  

Whichever, AeroPark makes the folly of Capilion all too conspicuous. Tugade would have stuck out like a sore thumb had he been present in the groundbreaking rites.         

Even if he did not lose in Asia CEO Award’s Global Filipino Executive of the Year.