The state of the Clark Freeport, for real

 A PAGE straight out of the state-of-the-city address playlist of San Fernando Mayor Vilma Balle-Caluag was the state-of-the-Clark-Freeport address of Atty. Agnes VST Devanadera, president-CEO of Clark Development Corp.

In so many ways, with the “first parallel” as starting point: the first-ever lady mayor of Pampanga’s capital city delivering her first-ever SOCA; the first-ever female boss of CDC making the first-ever SOCFA in the state-owned estate.

Video presentations occupied the pre-address wait: mostly campaign promises accomplished, in the case of Balle-Caluag; an unabashed homage to the self for VST Devanadera.

Darkened hallways preceded both addresses – instantly stirring in the mind dramatic bridal entrances, sans the wedding march.

And then the dance performances, not so much inserted intermissions as integral parts of the SOCA/SOCFA program at par with the national anthem, invocation, and the city or corporate hymns.

Indeed, “showca” as the double visionary Deng Pangilinan of iOrbit News punned both. The similitude ends there.

The state of the Clark Freeport that Devanadera presented before a herded audience of locators and CDC employees was long on pomp, plaudits and platitudes, but short on the actuality obtaining in the freeport.

Why, it even resurrected that delusion of long ago – at the time of Rufo Colayco, or Sergio Naguiat at CDC, if memory still serves right – of a Disney or Universal at the then sub-zone now New Clark City. Keep on wishing upon that star, folks.

Too bad for Devanadera, her SOCFA cannot, even but thinly, gloss over the glaring state of things at the freeport – RESTIVENESS.

Investors and locators, for over a year now, have the proverbial Sword of Damocles hanging over their heads with the implementing rules and regulations (IRR) of the CREATE Law, and Revenue Regulation 21-2021 and Revenue Memorandum Circular 24-2022 issued by the Bureau of Internal Revenue that expunged certain duty-free and tax privileges they have enjoyed as locators in a special economic zone/freeport, and later mandated by RA 11534 or the Corporate Recovery and Tax Incentives for Enterprises, enacted in February 2021.

The Clark Investors and Locators Association holds that the IRR and the BIR regulations “effectively invalidated the cross-border doctrine, the very rationale for the existence of freeport zones such as the Clark, Subic Bay and others.”

Consequently, CILA says, a growing number of their membership has altogether ceased considering expanding their operations and even started thinking of decamping to other more business-friendly neighboring nations.

But for the perfunctory “we support our locators, being the freeport’s lifeblood,” what has CDC done to help them?

So, Devanadera said in SOCFA that the locators’ cause has been taken to House and Senate committees and measures have been filed for hearings. Alas, the locators have heard too much of that mantra from the same House and Senate members they had met with that it has lost not only urgency but, more so, any efficacy.          

Restive too are South Korean investors in the P2.6-billion The Sharp Clark Hills tourism estate who decried the developer for allegedly refusing to endorse them to the CDC for their approved sub-lease agreements.

Hyped as a residential complex combining apartments and resorts, boasts of state-of-the-art condominium buildings, with support amenities such as a clubhouse, swimming pool, gym, spa and other related facilities, The Sharp Clark Hills is “magnet to Korean investors.”

While the rift between investors and the developer – a sub-sub lease agreement fiasco – is no direct concern of the CDC, it impacts on the general atmosphere of the freeport as “a livable, vibrant and dynamic work and play destination.”

And yes, the investors are planning to take their grievances right at the doorstep of Devanadera. 

Restiveness even older and longer than CILA’s is that pervading the rank-and-file CDC employees.

As though the removal of their allowances, benefits and incentives (ABIs) – up to P14,000 monthly – with the implementation of the Compensation and Position Classification System were not enough, a “mandatory” migration to GSIS from their current retirement and pension provider SSS has been imposed upon the employees by the CDC.

A clear double whammy for the poor workers at CDC there. But does the CDC leadership even care?

So, an earlier press release from Devanadera’s office cited the Governance Commission for Government-Owned or -Controlled Corporations as confirming that CDC’s actual committed investments reached P2.314 billion, surpassing the target of P 1.729 billion; and that this “serves as the foundation for setting organizational goals and offering performance-based incentives for employees.”

The jaded Association of Concerned CDC Employees had a ready retort to this: “Tell that to the Marines.”

Many firsts, we concede, have been achieved in the first year of Devanadera’s incumbency at CDC. At least three cited here:

First-ever in the history of Clark, dating back to the period of its American occupation, that a tricycle managed to breeze through the main gate and reached the first traffic light before being apprehended. This was only last month, the historic, if law-breaking, feat celebrated in social media. 

First ever that a human trafficking ring was busted inside the Clark Freeport – at the Colorful and Leap Group Co. located in Clark Sun Valley Hub last May – resulting to the rescue of 1,090 individuals – 389 Vietnamese, 307 Chinese, 171 Filipinos, 143 Indonesians, 40 Nepalese, 25 Malaysians, seven Burmese, five Thai, two Taiwanese and one from Hong Kong, the biggest haul in a police rescue ever.

The victims were forced into working for at least 18 hours a day in a “fraudulent cyber-enabled industry,” victimizing their fellow citizens by investing in cryptocurrencies. Alas, Clark gone global in something patently criminal.

First ever that a CDC president celebrated her birthday with a fund-raising Lugaw-for-a-Cause with tickets priced at P5,000 each “good-as-sold” to locators and investors sans the reglementary DSWD permit.   
Tubong lugaw, the operative phrase in CDC ever since. The very state of the Clark estate, for real.