MANILA: The Philippines’ Finance Secretary Carlos Dominguez III (pic) assured the public that neither the government nor taxpayers would be on the losing side in deals entered into with the private sector for big-ticket infrastructure projects.

       Dominguez told the House committee on ways and means that at the start of the Duterte administration, it reviewed the projects undertaken through the public-private partnership (PPP) mode, amid rising contingent liabilities.

       “There is no such thing as ‘no cost to the government’ - there is always a cost, and the cost is either borne by the government or by the taxpayer, or by the user of PPP projects”, Dominguez said.

       Among these contingent liabilities are guarantees of revenue and of return of investment, which the government will shoulder, as well as fees and charges, which consumers will pay, the Finance chief noted.

       While the PPP Centre was still preparing a report on these contingent liabilities, Dominguez said that “we were quite surprised with the amount of liabilities that these so-called PPP projects in the past had generated.”The Development Budget Coordination Committee had estimated contingent liabilities arising from PPP projects to have reached 311.8 billion pesos (US$6.2bil or RM26bil) last year.

       For the PPP projects awarded during the current administration, Dominguez said the liabilities had been “limited” to not burden the government and users.

       Dominguez cited the airport and water utility PPPs in New Clark City, which he claimed had “totally different” contracts compared with previous deals entered into by the government. The Finance chief said the Clark water contract, for instance, was unlike those with Manila Water and Maynilad, which the government reviewed and renegotiated for allegedly being “onerous”.

       The Clark International Airport expansion was also “much better in terms of contingent liability management than the PPP project that was done for the airport in Cebu,” Dominguez added. — The Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN

       The updated list of flagship infrastructure projects in the “Build, Build, Build” pipeline included 20 unsolicited PPP projects worth 1.5 trillion pesos (RM124.63bil), which will be financed by tycoons’ deep pockets. – The Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN